A Psalm of Thanksgiving

I search for you in adjectives
I build a new vocabulary
Waterfalls of pleasing phrases
Words that dance in primal rhythm
To liberate inchoate feelings

But all my effort is as nothing
All my phrases turn to ash
I am inadequate to name you
All my pages are as blank
As barren lands in winter.

I seek you out in colors
Arctic blue, dusk indigo
The ice and depth of your resolve
Red of lipstick, blood, and candy
Satin taupe of new-shorn vulva

But all the colors merge to black
The black of crushing gravity
The black of empty, deathless night
The black of frantic, fruitless searches
Where you elude me once again.

I try to suss you out in sounds
In slides and trills and trumpet blasts
The sublime melody that births
Each time you smile and fill me up
With psalms of praise and songs of grace.

But you are more than all of these
And not the same as any.
You have a shape that sounds like colors
You are the light that is the Word
There are no ropes or chains or irons
To hold you fast and yield to me
Your inmost depth, your truest nature
I seek, I search, I try to fathom
And find myself alone and weeping.

My love, my love, where have you gone?