Selfishness

 There is something immensely selfish

about loving someone that doesn't exist
except inside me as a humming prophecy,
a song my fingers do not know yet,
but I have strum the strings for long,
I want to breathe life into these dreams,
fill them with my lessons and repairs
until the laughter in my house is innocence,
Innocence that falls and breaks in chips,
Innocence that reminds me of wonder
and invites me to intervene but I will not,
because she must know discovery,
know falling to run with lighter feet,
learn that grief can be the weight of wings,
I will teach him to see himself with my eyes
when mirrors show the lies others repeat,
I will teach her to argue with herself
until what remains is indomitable,
and then I shall call her a diamond.
See, I learnt to dance with strangers
until I had lost thousands in the crowd
but my children will know how to find stars,
pin them to their hearts without burning,
She will know the charm within desert dunes,
and weather them like motes of sand,
He will know my summer-dream hide-outs,
those found when winters were meaner,
thus he will remember my nightmares with fondness
and tie long, satin ribbons to the gates I unlocked.

Sometimes I worry that I stock paint
but will never have the time to fill colors,
small fingers will close on large ones
until they are too large to fit inbetween
but I do not mind the winds in my chest
passing through foreign treetops,
to sing different songs to cliffsides,
I will bequeath the poems I wrote inside caves,
and when they sail to make new mistakes
my lodestones will point to the North Star
Their nights will coax their sweet fruit
into wines I will never drink, never taste,
and I will be the artist that left the world
work that changes with eyes and names.

Image Source: Dorian Florez