What Lies Beyond

Within the darkness of my soul you found light.
Though we will never touch, see, or feel the other, you have faith.
Too much sometimes is this pain of what separates us, yet you hope.
I command you without any power to demand your compliance; you give anyway.
How long might we be the us we have found?
There is no answer.

My fear is strong, to allow my heart to be consumed by one so beautiful.
You ease my fear with your submission. Pure, rare, undeserved.
The ache that burns deep is never quenched, yet I come to you night after night.
In my mind, my dreams, my fantasies, you give more than any flesh before me can.
Loneliness a part of every night, until the day you came to me.
Your defiance expected, your submission a surprise.

The words you spoke that night, I love you, induced my silence.
Paralyzed by fear, I said nothing in return. My fear all consuming, unbroken.
You, a braver soul, stepped forward into the realm where the unspoken lived.
You created sound, sound that drew fear, fear that drew silence.
No words came to respond. My lips made silent by a heart afraid to go there.
Yet, your patience was stronger than all else.

Shhhh…..Listen, you said to me. The unspoken saying more than any words could.
To deny by fear what was so obvious to you, I was destined to give in.
You knew from the beginning, my fear could be overcome and you waited.
Still I feel that gripping terror at the thought that I cannot give you all I want to give.
Separated by miles and worlds apart, we exist together yet always apart.
You accept this existence without questioning the pitfalls and dangers that lurk in the darkness.
And I fear all that I feel for you inside.

There is a barrier that will forever keep us apart. In love and in life, we are destined to be two.
When I fear the pain I bring to you, it is eased by your desire to suffer with me.
You submit because you feel what I fear and you accept what I recede from.
What ending is there for a love such as this, I cannot know.
But an ending there will one day be. Hoping always that the parting will not be painful for you.
For I have suffered long before I knew you and I can suffer again, but a pain greater than myself would be the pain of hurting you.

There is no ending that will be good, when the clock has turned its number of times and brings us to that point.
Your tears will burn like fire against my heart, and I will carry the joy and the pain together within me forever.
I cannot resist your love so I give in to you and I love you with my soul, knowing all the while that pain will come and it will be merciless. And I will suffer with you as we part knowing all the while that the love we shared was worth whatever the price we will have to pay.