A Month Full of Nights

The moon rose next to Mars tonight
and full
A month ago and further North it was
we saw its fulness last—
gaping into its beams as if drunk
on the wind and stars—
Bathed in its ghostly radiance
we gave and received tendernesses,
our eyes gleaming,
our lips parted,
speaking into the night
prayers our swelling hearts conceived
to the God who placed it there—
and us—just so—
the moon above the slowly drifting cloud,
precisely between two straight, dark silhouettes of pine—

we sat closely, touching, on a bench
as if in private audience
and spoke in whispers:
“O God of the moon and stars,
be blessed,” we prayed,
“and rest—knowing
how no single speck of your world
goes unnoticed, unsavored
this night!”

A month full of nights
has passed since then:
whether parted by 2000 miles
or merely a breath—
We have climbed into the sky,
sat peaceful above fog and tree
on the rim of the world
Watching the occasional blur of passing headlights
from the corner of one eye,
the Summer Triangle from the other,
we discussed weighty and trivial matters
On two nights we read to each other
poems
and some several times
until the meaning made us sigh
or smile
You would turn to me,
announce the next, and wait—
and I found in that pause
more meaning than in
all the lines which followed
On some sacred nights there were tears—
their familiar paths, once unmarked,
now measured
and traced by gentle fingers
And there was great pain,
excruciating doubt
and confusion almost to despair

Present in this night
are all those nights
all their impressions and fragrances
their delight and their dread
Yet it’s on other ground
that I lay down confident—
more hope in my heart
than all the flimsy hopes I conjured there before—
Not built on a month full of memories
which are (of necessity, perhaps) one thing to me
and another to you—
For today (and every day)
you have not spared me from reality
but helped me to find it
You have not deceived me
as one to be used
but you have honored me
as a person worthy of respect
You have not so much spoken of love
as proved it—
and for that proof
I smile and thank the God of love
for granting me such a friend—
someone who dares to tell me
the truth