ROMANCE Poem: The Pine and The Storm, by Linda Boxall

I wandered far through sea and storm,
No steady voice, no hand-kept warm,
But found you near so soft, so true,
A whisper soft the wild winds blew.

Your voice, like midnight’s gentle rain,
A slow, low, healing refrain,
And in its sound, I find relief
Words that could soften any grief.

You smell of pine, of earth and sky,
A scent that holds when nights run dry,
A scent I chase through dream and day,
That does not leave, nor fade away.

I am the storm, untamed, unbound,
Wild winds that howl without a sound.
You are the pine, firm and wise,
Standing tall beneath these skies.

You said you’d support, come storm or sun,
No matter what I’ve said or done
That if I called, if I should plead,
You’d be the one my heart would heed.

I fear, I fade, I flee, I break.
I speak in spirals, drowning ache,
But still I find you, still, you wait,
Unshaken by my shifting state.

You are not ink I’d write anew,
Nor tale I’d twist to make it true
You are the page, the song, the muse,
The one I feel called to choose.

So let them speak of space and time,
Of stars that burn, of fate and sign…
But all I want, through dusk and dew,
Is just one world
One path
With you.

By Linda Boxall