Hard Love

Where are words of natural affection?
In tremble of windows?
In tumble of flesh and bone
across wood and stone?
Where?
On paper
words appear thin as smoke,
lost as a lover’s hand drawn away:
cold comfort.
The heart demands comfort hard,
truth hard as fist upon face,
as bruise upon heart.
The heart demands
your palms will open to hold my face,
your hand will no longer bruise my heart,
and your heart will never break mine, again.
These are my words.
Are they enough?

John T. Hitchner