Psalm on the streets of Prenzlauer Berg
To be with you is to walk alone on quiet city streets —
a nearly silent soundtrack of leather soles and their soft krisks
against the paper flames of leaves and mottled cobbled stones,
the air so still as near to hear each thud of heart—
and in solitude find communion.
To be with you is to imagine entire conversations
and to know that you must know each thought,
you are so deeply aware of me—
I hardly need voice any words, we are so familiar
you hear my thoughts as they condense,
but I tell you everything anyway for the joy of it;
the joy of speaking to you, the joy of you listening to me.
To be with you is to be arrayed before you,
intimately displayed in all my fullness,
assured of my belovedness in your gaze—
Have I ever loved anyone or anything as completely as you love me?
Let me be an acolyte of your love;
let me sit and absorb the way you look at me;
let me write your love on the inside of my eyelids
so that I see it when I sleep and dream of you;
let me apprentice your love and partake in your practice,
let me grow in your love, mature in your love, steep in your love;
let me know your love so well I can speak it from memory,
I can recognize it from behind a thousand yards away,
I can remember its face after a hundred years of separation,
I can teach it just by breathing, it is so natural to me;
and even then how much deeper will your love for me still be.
