The Long Road Home

When I was little I thought love was romance:
A riverside walk with sweet smells in the air-
two people who knew the world but didn't even care-
two people who only knew that the other was there.

When I got older I thought it was commitment:
A deep devotion to an ideal without question-
suffering while suffering was my predilection-
breaking down life into problem/solution section by section.

Then later a boy scorned thought love was seclusion:
To put forth effort had born sour fruit-
love was just head games and sex, that's the truth!
And it seemed that we were all just shadows abused.

Oh love in my present I cannot determine:
Sometimes I feel romance and sometimes like vermin.
Always I'm committed but I can't always heal my world-
All I know is I live, in the eyes of this beautiful girl-

I sweat to think she might feel the same way as me
I want for her joy so much sometimes I can't breath
I must be aloof to capture her fascination but still
inside my heart there's a welling jubilation-

That I should hide much more because I feel it might bore
her need for something different that she might not abhor.
What winded breaths I have taken feeling Jackie's sensation-
I wish for happiness and for joy but each has limited duration-

Sometimes. I feel like crying and others like dying-
but I digress. Let me get to the point that I've been trying
to say all along which is that love can't be explained.
Like god looked into my soul and had me arraigned.

All of a sudden I saw my world in her eyes
and my child in her womb and I couldn't tell her lies.
Which would have been easier.
God knows to tell the truth she'll see my heart-
And heaven's never known me since lying was my art.

Love for you's a desert, yet it's filled with infinite parts
Characters to play and puzzle pieces to an exploded heart.
separations to my vices and devotion to you.
my piece of the world and that's the best I can construe.

I've told you what my love is and how I came to it's conclusion
and as you see it's still a mystery, like amnesia memories from contusions.
none of it's an illusion, though, I feel the love for you
I'm your special cup of coffee from our own beans that we brew

Before you I was blind and could not count on my senses
I felt the world would harm me and I had up full defenses
I love you though, and in the darkness, I finally can see
that one thing I know for sure: The words, "I love Jacqueline Suzanne Tyree."