***The High Romance***

Flashes of Fire

A Passionate Response
to the Song of Songs (Part II)

by Jon Trott
Christmas 2004
For Carol

Introduction to part the second:

The poet, indwelt by the Holy Spirit,
Cannot even so create holy writ.
These lines perhaps tell too much, unlike
The god-words of that unknown writer -
Perhaps Solomon, perhaps the shepherd, or
Even (I would wish) the Shulammite.
So I tell of things hidden, believing in Christ
That even the hidden is now proper revealed.
If by so doing I offend the sensitive eye,
Or cause another's tender feelings to reel,
I humbly offer apology, yet still must write
Of love's fire rooted in flesh and eternity.
If I bare too much, bear with me.
It is because love lives that I dare to write.
By Him, and her, enslaved, I make so free.

Flashes of Fire

I come to my garden, my sister, my bride; I gather my myrrh with my spice, I eat my honeycomb with my honey, I drink my wine with my milk.

Now comes the time beyond time, when desire unlocks desire
And two become one in Holy Spirit's Fire…

He yields to patience, denying desire to stoke the fire.
She yields to that which belongs to him, and her,
And by so yielding, causes him to yield in kind.
Who is to say when tongue ceases caressing, or
Thighs meet thighs, the long, slow entering?

Some say he bears a sword, but love is defenseless.
Some say he penetrates the secret, but does he?
Some say he knows as he is known, and yet
Ever seeks to know her with whom he unifies.
She wants only to be known, in gentle reverence,
And he trembles, fearful to injure or defile
Until with glad grasp her friendly limbs
Bring him within her embrace, arms and thighs.

Who is who in this rite of first community?
Who enters and who is being entered?
He enters his garden, no longer hers, and
She enters his thighs, his taut essence her liquid embrace.
They touch each other, and so themselves.
They enter the selves of one another,
The rushing blood and rising rivers of desire.
And then it is hard to know who enters,
And who rises like a flood with cries of joy,
And who drinks the wine, or provides the milk to be drunk,
And who cries first, or who after, with newborn voice?

Quietude comes after comes cease;
The tides have temporary turned, the moon
Ceases for the moment pulling oceans higher.
Each now looks at the other as part of themselves,
Yet truth told, more mysterious and unkown.
Who twined, and who did the twining?
Who's roots more deeply drink of the
Other's rich, dark soil, the secret chambers of the heart?

Eat, friends, drink, and be drunk with love.

How much excess offends the holiness of God?
How far is too far in giving and receiving so-called carnal bliss?
Embrace her, dear groom, taste this part of yourself
And yourself be entered by her seeking, yearning strength
So that you may learn the art of surrendered love.
Be overcome, and overcome again, until in overcoming,
You come under the power of love's tidal pull;
Drown, then, yes. Go down for a third time,
Baptized in one another's flesh, rising a new creature,
A creation unused to air, preferring the endless sea.

Tremble they may, tremble they will
And the surging of this primal tide washes clean
Yet never clean enough; purity always wants more.
Imbibe, then. Drink deeply of this endless draught;
Look at your life companion, adore. Then being
Lovers and so friends, continue as before.

I slept, but my heart was awake. Listen! my beloved is knocking. "Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my perfect one; for my head is wet with dew, my locks with the drops of the night."

We reveal ourselves completely in this act,
Naked past the skin, all the way down to the bone.
Must I reveal myself to you again, stripping off
The comforts of self, its delusions and desires that war
Against our love? Strange how annoying your voice is,
Thin and desperate sounding in the dark of night.

She hears his knock, her heart burns - and who can say
Which heart she speaks of - for him, and for his embrace.
Yet to open to him means to once again burn, revealed.
His head is wet with dew, sweat, tears; pains of this world.
He would have comfort in her, with her. She is his
New Home, his true friend, and perfect lover.
Yet she forgets in this moment, and danger comes.

I had put off my garment; how could I put it on again? I had bathed my feet; how could I soil them?

Comfort is the enemy. Lassitude and passivity mock us.
She lies upon her back, warm between legs for him,
But warmer still beneath blankets, and
Unwilling to rise to the occasion.
In short, she cannot be troubled;
Love, and her lover, have become a bother.

Her nakedness should have been her yearning;
Her feet should have been the means to meet love.
Instead, she forgot that love requires the
Setting aside of self. Inertia is death, not love.

My beloved thrust his hand into the opening, and my inmost being yearned for him.

Love, subversive force, causes her to moisten
At the sound of his voice; his fumbling at the door
Reach her as if his fingers move between her legs
Causing her body, thus the heart, to yearn

I arose to open to my beloved, and my hands dripped with myrrh, my fingers with liquid myrrh, upon the handles of the bolt.

Now she's hot for him, as a touch between reveals,
Her fingers wet with the essences he should be tasting,
Her hands slick with the moisture she should be
Using upon his body to give it easy entrance to hers.
Her hands slick with spices his presence calls forth,
Yearning for him, her body open like a house in summer.

I opened to my beloved, but my beloved had turned and was gone. My soul failed me when he spoke. I sought him, but did not find him; I called him, but he gave no answer.

What would happen if I opened my heart
And you, my love, were not inside it?
Let the love I hold for God be left, or I
Would die. Foolish idiot, I forget to love you
And then you go away, and who can say
You'll be back some day? I'm shaken,
So eager to see your face and whisper,
"I'm sorry, so sorry," over and over again.
I'm a backslider, failure in all things
But willing-please God-to learn.

Forgive. I wait for the voice, and silence
Answers me. Forgive. Cheap grace riff,
Silhouetted against my willful failures,
Cold heartedly insensitive, or angry
In my rags of self-righteous indignation.

Please come home. Please answer
The plaintive call of the repentant heart.
Even the body conspires against me,
Its loneliness for you a sort of slow dying.

Making their rounds in the city the sentinels found me; they beat me, they wounded me, they took away my mantle, those sentinels of the walls.

Without your love, the law is all that's left.
The handcuffs out, arrested, off I go to jail.
Pathetic love-drunk fool, wandering alone
And without the robe you gave me, the
Robe of your family, identifying me with you.
Rescue me, darling; I'm powerless without you.
I'm helpless without your love.

I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my beloved, tell him this: I am faint with love.

Purity burns, and my impurity prevents love's flame;
Tell him I tremble for his touch, his breath, his entrance
Into my temple; I am love's temple,
But no worshipper comes to meet God there.
I am a house without occupants,
I shiver in the cold,
Vertigo-struck,
Until he returns to claim me.

What is your beloved more than another beloved, O fairest among women? What is your beloved more than another beloved, that you thus adjure us?

Oh, the false questions of abstract thought!
Love cannot be compared to blurred reflections,
Nor the rise of ecstasy he gives
To the smallish pleasures old men find
Counting coins or facts or bodies of their enemies.
Ask a real question and I'll give you answers-
But all right then, I'll answer kind in kind,
Though still you'll smile with superior gaze
As though the price of love were something haggled
In a marketplace - even a marketplace of ideas!

My beloved is all radiant and ruddy, distinguished among ten thousand.

There is no man beside him, and all men are in him.

He opened my heart, and my body
To the openness within himself to me.
This is the way of a man with a maid,
The mystery no mere observer will ever know.

His head is the finest gold; his locks are wavy, black as a raven.

His face is all faces to me, so precious;
His hair wraps around my fingers,
He cries out in playful pain as I pull its thickness,
Dark mysterious life, from life growing
Even as from that other thick tangle
Grows the mystery rising!

His eyes are like doves beside springs of water, bathed in milk, fitly set.

His eyes? Birds rise over mist, early morning sunlight.
No armies march in the pupils, and swords
melt beneath the pureness of his falling gaze.

His cheeks are like beds of spices, yielding fragrance.

I stroke his face, stubble's scritch against my fingers.
This fragile creature, so full of life, loves me.
He is my aroma of life.

His lips are lilies, distilling liquid myrrh.

My dark bud held, swelling, beneath his melting tongue,
While my heart, black velvet blossom, receives his kisses.
Ruby lips meet lips
Of dark hue;
strangely wonderful my hidden honey tastes
As he shares it with my first lips, then
Again blossoms his mouth to take more,
To drink deeper, fresh-springing dew.

His arms are rounded gold, set with jewels.

Let his shoulders hold my head,
And his arms take me close.
Tears I'll cry, and pain I'll know.
His arms will not protect me from all;
Comfort me, dear arms, and that will
Be enough for me; hold me and
Let love be the one true home we have.

His body is ivory work, encrusted with sapphires.

Oh, mystery of the male body,
This body, inlaid with sacred stones,
Two between and beneath, held
Cunningly in their delicate purse;
The slant of angled rising ivory,
The cloud of pubic hair, and the
Stomach arrogant and muscular.

Or how tender it is, the phallus unrisen,
Hidden and shy amongst the fine-spun nest.
A magical wand, its dark ruby,
And all things made by the hand of love
For me, only for me!

His legs are alabaster columns, set upon bases of gold. His appearance is like Lebanon, choice as the cedars.

Oh! Simple lines! Yet not one absolute,
All curving, more or less, tenderness,
Each muscle and sinew and tendon
Combining with another in
Absolute unity. Twin marvels, these
Legs of his, my legs, raising him up
As casually as if such a rising
Were not miracle, and if such marvels
Were not in fact proof that love exists.

I would touch the golden hair,
The hard muscular thigh, and kiss
The bunched buttocks, his glory!
He stands above me, casual in this nakedness,
Shores of Lebanon, trees taller than the sky,
Not knowing I worship at his shrine
And by so worshipping do honor
Love, that hedonist God of holiness.

He is altogether mine, and altogether wonderous!

His speech is most sweet, and he is altogether desirable. This is my beloved and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem.

His voice strikes chords of music from my bones;
All are melodious, all are spring.

You wanted to know, but what do you know?
Categorize this! Measure that! Love laughs,
And he holds me up when your idols' idleness
Leads to violence and sorrow and tears.
He is unlike any number, and calls your
Ideas foolish; he kisses me until I faint,
And keeps kissing until I rise in glory upon glory.

Where has your beloved gone, O fairest among women? Which way has your beloved turned, that we may seek him with you?

(Can they be serious? Do they desire him for themselves?
If so, am I worthy of him, or will he leave me in this desert
And take one of them for his new consort?
I am afraid, yet love beckons me to him, and to search.
Will not their search reveal love better than mine alone?
And is not love large enough to embrace their need?
O, God of Love, see these lost ones, of whom I once was.
Reveal their lovers as false, lead them to your lover,
And lead me again to my own. I am in need…)

My beloved has gone down to his garden, to the beds of spices, to pasture his flock in the gardens, and to gather lilies.

Inexpressible, the kindness of his return;
Once again the garden waits;
Let your fingers wander
Through my diadem of hair,
Spices welling from the secret beds.
Let your body enter my heart,
My breasts at your mouth as we rise and fall.

I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine; he pastures his flock among the lilies.

Peace, great peace, after the climax,
And we lie in one another's arms
Unsure of time or place or even who is who.
He wanders my quiet body, curious and I,
I wander his to find out why such a simple thing
Can so totally change everything.

Damn, damn the abstract body,
The bodies of the past, or of books.
Only his body matters to me, and
Only my body matters to him.
He is my absolute, and I his.
Over us, Love feeds us to make us hungry!

You are beautiful as Tirzah, my love, comely as Jerusalem, terrible as an army with banners.

Ancient cities of God, seats of power and glory,
Your beauty, my darling lady, awes me more
Than armies with their spears and swords.
Only fools believe that women are not wise,
Though some old men in love with their despair
Might dare to say that your beauty is not from
Love of God, and me, and the life we share.

Turn away your eyes from me, for they overwhelm me! Your hair is like a flock of goats, moving down the slopes of Gilead.

All is peace until your gaze finds mine; then
All is tumult, heat, and desire!
Your multitudes of silky hair,
wander down the perfect terrain
Of your cheeks, with your eyes conspire.
I perspire! Come kiss me, or I'll expire entire!

Your teeth are like a flock of ewes, that have come up from the washing; all of them bear twins, and not one among them is bereaved.

So beautifully said, I tried to match it for a while,
All that occurs to me is this: "You have a beautiful smile."

(You felt pain in a tooth, you feared it would decay,
And I prayed for your tooth's healing,
But isn't all life heading toward the dentist, our love
Notwithstanding; hold on, baby, I see you.
Life can wear away your teeth, but nothing will
Take His love, or mine, from you.)

Your cheeks are like halves of a pomegranate behind your veil.

The sunlight through a window
Strikes your face all at angles, and the brown
Perfection of your skin, the heat
Of my heart in response, and I'd
Love to open your lips, taste inside your
Mouth to see
Are your cheeks as sweet tasting as they look?

There are sixty queens and eighty concubines, and maidens without number. My dove, my perfect one, is the only one, the darling of her mother, flawless to her that bore her. The maidens saw her and called her happy; the queens and concubines also, and they praised her.

Solomon had his harem, and David had his wives,
But where was love that remained when desire dimmed
And ruined kingdoms fell to dust?
I see you, my kingdom and my far country,
My mystery lady and everyday wife.
Even our earthly kingdom of love
Will one day fail, one passing over and one left;
and what then, beloved?
Praise this woman, for her love is true and faithful.
Praise this woman, for her beauty is unfading
In these eyes of mine.
Her love will remain, love will remain.
And desire rises even from ashes.

"Who is this that looks forth like the dawn, fair as the moon, bright as the sun, terrible as an army with banners?"

Oh, my love, your femininity overwhelms me with its power,
The milky way pours from your sky
And the flashing flames of a summer sun
Rise on my heart's horizon
As the morning comes, and desire flies
To meet it.

I went down to the nut orchard, to look at the blossoms of the valley, to see whether the vines had budded, whether the pomegranates were in bloom.

He assails her blood, her thoughts, and nature
Conspires with love to color all with red and yellow,
The sticky seeds and opened fruit
Only blooms now, only blooms, but soon
The sweet branches will droop with fruit's weight;
Oh, to tear at the fruit, to eat the delights inside!

Before I was aware, my fancy set me in a chariot beside my prince.

The horse in front of, the chariot beneath us,
And his arms around me, holding me safe
As we sped along, reckless in love's wild abandon!
The horse's animal sweat like pungent perfume,
His muscles rippling as he runs before us.
Oh, to hear your whinny as you run;
Oh, to see you ride in my saddle, horse-tamer!

Return, return, O Shulammite! Return, return, that we may look upon you.

So, you again, the observer / dissector of love,
Interrupter of pleasant daydreams.
Have you not yet heard the truth?
Have you not yet seen what is right in front of your face?

Why should you look upon the Shulammite, as upon a dance before two armies?

I am not yours to own, to make a dancing girl of, to
Make fodder for study or gossip.
He awaits me. Begone, you boring abstractions.
Extract yourselves from the predicament you're in,
But I am out of it, in love, and here he comes.

How graceful are your feet in sandals, O queenly maiden! Your rounded thighs are like jewels, the work of a master hand.

She is a dancer, even when she moves unaware
That he watches her,
For she always dances in his eyes.

Oh, the thighs, their perfect circles within circles,
Drawing warmth from my hands as
I caress each, drawing them and their bearer
Toward my eagerness.

Your navel is a rounded bowl that never lacks mixed wine. Your belly is a heap of wheat, encircled with lilies.

This wine most intoxicating, it increases my thirst.
Wine mixed, but never the same, you torment me.
My tongue samples and my body shakes, drunk
With the vibrant soilful, rootful, flavor of your rain.

Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle.

Or am I the deer, grazing gently, finding
The twin pink blossoms,
Nibbling at their widened petals?
So soft, I murmer, so warm;
And you hold me tenderly, cooing.
I remember God's words, that he would
Nurse Israel as a Mother her child.
I am your man, your love, yet
For a moment,
God nurses me through you.

Your neck is like an ivory tower. Your eyes are pools in Heshbon, by the gate of Bath-rabbim. Your nose is like a tower of Lebanon, overlooking Damascus.

You are so proud, so strong, so elegant, my love.
The brightness of the waters at Heshbon
Dazzle me not as much as your brown eyes' shinings,
And the graceful straightness of your nose
Is as a multi-colored window, the final touch
To an already perfected tower
Which shames all its neighbors by its beauty.

Your head crowns you like Carmel, and your flowing locks are like purple; a king is held captive in the tresses.

The life down the mountain in all its greens and blossoms,
The tumbling cataracts and long grasses,
None compare to you, my beautiful one, my
Brown-skinned beloved, and the hair so thick
I lose myself in it and can't get out again.

How fair and pleasant you are, O loved one, delectable maiden!

He is a seducer, and seduces, or begins,
And she smiles, as being seduced is her hope,
And so love is best, when mutual seduction
Is done by those who should be seduced,
Those whose pledges make such games
A pure, and thus white-hot, pursuit.

You are stately as a palm tree, and your breasts are like its clusters.

Sway, girl, sway, the palm leaves waving slowly
As your trunk undulates
And the clusters move to and fro.
"Come see," they say, "Come touch."
Oh, yes, he hears the swaying
As if it were his own heart beating.

I say I will climb the palm tree and lay hold of its branches. Oh, may your breasts be like clusters of the vine, and the scent of your breath like apples, and your kisses like the best wine that goes down smoothly, gliding over lips and teeth.

Good lover, be forward with her now; she smiles,
Inviting your frank and erotic praises.
Climb her body like a boy into his treehouse;
Climb, and grasp the swelling fruit to your mouth.
Breathe her appled breath; taste her tongue,
And drink her kisses tenderly, savoring each
As if it were the first kiss, and the last.

I am my beloved's, and his desire is for me.

He loves her, and she knows this.
Miracles begin when the beloved responds.
God's love lies unrequited, so many
Will not yield, but choose rather the lonely way.
His desire is for her, and him, and all.

Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the fields, and lodge in the villages; let us go out early to the vineyards, and see whether the vines have budded, whether the grape blossoms have opened and the pomegranates are in bloom. There I will give you my love.

Here is the woman without peer, the lover who takes
Not of greed but of desire most pure and holy and right.
She is so strong, so forward, wanting him.
She initiates love, and love outdoors, uncaring
If the vinedressers catch them, or a wandering eye sees.
She is not ashamed of desire, her desire, for him.
She revels in it. In him she finds her only help;
Desire is hers to give, and his to give,
Hers to take, and his to take in return.
Free woman, blessed among women are you,
Sweet Shulammite. Teach all women to love
As you do, purity and heat incandescent!

I thought I heard her say, perhaps it was fancy,
"Oh, my beloved, lie with me in the green,
beneath the blooms of orange and purple,
their aroma mixing with my body's oils.
I will give you all my love, my entire body,
My heart, my being; let us be free in one another."

And then I thought I heard her whisper,
"Kiss me as much as you love me, and
love me as much as you kiss me."
And I thought-perhaps dreamt-that he
Laid her down in the tall grasses there,
The vines above them as they twined,
And with the wind's sighs they sighed,
The branches creaked and groaned
And the wind shook the day alive.

The mandrakes give forth fragrance, and over our doors are all choice fruits, new as well as old, which I have laid up for you, O my beloved.

My body is a mandrake, a magical herb.
I have laid up for you, my love,
All precious fruits, none having any
Until you, my beloved husband, none.
My storehouse is full, the fruits are all
Different, new ones discovered since
We wed, and old ones I've held inside my
Hopes and dreams. All fruits ripening
As you winnow my fields, and prune
My orchards, and plow - please - my ground!

O, that you were like a brother to me, who nursed at my mother's breast! If I met you outside, I would kiss you, and no one would despise me.

Displays of public affection they frown on,
Yet why should a sister get such greetings
While a wife must wait until night, or until
The orchard's trees hide our minglings?
Oh, to kiss you at will, no matter when or why.
What a delight that would be, but no.
Instead, I'll only smile, and you will shiver
With anticipation of what that smile means.

I would lead you and bring you into the house of my mother, and into the chamber of the one who bore me. I would give you spiced wine to drink, the juice of my pomegranates.

Fancy reigns, but it is a beautiful thing;
To take one's lover back to childhood things,
To show them the very place life began
And there (being sure not to be caught)
To mingle one's own life with the beloved's!
So drink of her, down her like a man;
Let her spices make you dizzy with joy,
As the childhood bed creaks dangerously!

O that his left hand were under my head, and that his right hand embraced me!

Please, my beloved, hurry to me; my body burns
With the need of your touch.
Again raise my head in your left hand's embrace,
Taste my honeyed mouth with yours,
And busy your right hand between my open, eager thighs!

I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, do not stir up or awaken love until it is ready!

Are you finally through merely watching,
Through with your intellectual cleverness?
And now you desire love?
Allow me to offer words of advice.
His love is ready, sweet girls. Yours is not.
Wait. Let him come to you, no others.
Let the wooing begin, and learn to suffer.
Forbid yourself lesser loves, or
His love will be lost, forever.
Do not stir up desire until desire knows
What your heart needs to know.
He loves you. You must learn to love Him.
As for a man… Ha! Find one who loves
The Proper Object of desire.
And that is enough abstraction for me.

Who is that coming up from the wilderness, leaning upon her beloved? Under the apple tree I awakened you. There your mother was in labor with you; there she who bore you was in labor.

I lean from weakness and lovemaking,
Or is it from lovemaking and lovemaking?
He merely smiles, but walks slowly himself,
Tipsy with our sharing.

Was he born beneath the tree where they loved?
Was she born in the bed where they loved?
What circle of life and love and desire
Rolls round them, and finds them eager
To continue the circle? Sweet love,
Sweet body, that allows love license to rove,
To adventure through the skin of another,
To taste the truth of experience, and
The experience of love.
Sweet apple tree, be always praised,
Always rooted in the heart of woman
And man, so that even the serpent
Cannot uproot this desire, or
The union desire creates.

Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm; for love is strong as death, passion fierce as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a raging flame.

I want to be your undergarment,
I want to be your golden chain.
I want to clasp beneath, beside,
Tied 'round your box like grocery string.
In your skin like a tribal tattoo
Be my fireplace, I'll be your wood
Be my flames, I'll be your heat.
Wind me around like a velvet blanket,
I'll be your pillow, you be my sheet.

Brand me into your heart, my body
Leave my mark upon your flesh.
Each love bite, each touch, each ecstasy,
Written into your skin like Scripture.
Oh, this passion is not impersonal!
Oh, this love burns like nova'd suns.
There, you, walking in the flames like Daniel
Unburnt, yet shining with incandescent glory.

Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it. If one offered for love all the wealth of his house, it would be utterly scorned.

What fuels this passion leaping like lightning?
It would burn as bright at the bottom of the sea.
Love so pure it burns even gold, the idols molten
In its uncaring passage, the money smoke
As we grasp each other's friendly bodies, careless
Of what they want, or sell, or think, or fear.

We have a little sister, and she has no breasts. What shall we do for our sister, on the day when she is spoken for?

How can we duplicate your fierce feminine purity?
How can we recreate your character of incandescence?
See her fragile smile, like her body, soul still forming.
Who will teach her love's burning singleness?
How will she be made ready when the beloved calls her name?
Purity of heart is to will one thing ; desire's hidden secret!

If she is a wall, we will build upon her a battlement of silver; but if she is a door, we will enclose her with boards of cedar.

Will she cultivate her garden
Waiting for the True Lover,
Or will she let the foxes run,
Willing to give a little to many
Rather than all to one?
Gird the secret garden with public adornments,
And the public garden with locks and walls.
The keeper of the garden her own heart,
Patient like a laser, or selling samples
Until the lights fail and the power is gone.

I was a wall, and my breasts were like towers; then I was in his eyes as one who brings peace.

Absolutely pure, in pure desire, she came to him.
No one but the seasons had touched her garden.
Her love burned the very air around him;
Self control does not mean what they think it means.
He came to her arms, and caught fire in
The marriage bed; her simplest touch burned forests.
Yet desire pure does not destroy;
After the conflagration comes absolute peace.
The forests burned, yet remain to burn again.
She kisses his face, and tastes his grateful tears.

Solomon had a vineyard at Baal-hamon; he entrusted the vineyard to keepers; each one was to bring for its fruit a thousand pieces of silver.

See the young king with sixty wives and eighty concubines ,
Seven hundred wives, and three hundred concubines
By the time he grew old.
Wealth works if coin or land or gems; but love
Is not wealth, and wives beyond number lessen love's power.
Tearful old man, Ecclesiastes and worship at foreign shrines,
Were these your final words after all else had failed you?
Your heart turned; what sort of love is love without purity?
God Himself an abstract fearsome Creator; had you forgotten?
Oh, sweet Shulammite! Oh, sweet love, who like Wisdom
Wanders the streets in search of one true lover,
Wanders and cries out, while we so often choose the easy way,
The loveless shadows, and the false wealth of lust.

My vineyard, my very own, is for myself; you, O Solomon, may have the thousand, and the keepers of the fruit two hundred!

She kept her garden for one; and one came into it.
She needed no keepers, but is herself its caretaker.
Solomon, who never knew one woman because he
Knew many, is mocked by the Shulammite's faithfulness.
Let the keepers tend his captive flock of wives;
She lives free, surrendering in freedom to one who
Values freedom, and in that freedom, gives himself to her
As one known only to and by her.

O you who dwell in the gardens, my companions are listening for your voice; let me hear it.

She calls him, though he dwells within her walls already.
Their love is secret, yet aromatic; Her friends smell blossoms
Even outside the garden walls. "Come to me," she says,
And her friends hear his whispers and rejoice at love's reality.

Make haste, my beloved, and be like a gazelle or a young stag upon the mountains of spices!

What I dreamt of in love-sick anticipation,
I now know, desire's power over me made real.
Come and drink my body's rivers,
Find shelter in my verdant, green valleys.
Leap graceful across the high peaks,
And nestle, grazing, in the spiced beds flowing.

God is real as the gasp of ecstasy,
And as eternal as my body's need.
Pure love, pure desire, I must celebrate
With you, my pet, browsing among my shoots.
Let me rush upward to you, and Him,
Love suddenly indivisible
As our bodies melt together,
And our hearts flame like stars.

For Carol (Christmas 2004)

Welcome to
High Romance Marriage Spices

Spice #7: Christmas / Birthday "Projects"

My wife is a "Project Queen." That is, my Carol makes her own cards, artwork, sews, even cuts and paints wood. She's amazing, and during the holidays all her friends and family hear from us because she's so organized and so good at loving others via her industrious hands.

If one of you in your marriage is the organized and/or talented one project-wise, draw the other into helping out. I may not be much for artwork, but Carol discovered that I'm good at lettering things. So I have a small but useful role at certain times. She's also quite busy with all these projects, and that can make me anxious and a little grouchy ("Where's my sugar, mama? Remember me?").

Instead of getting anxious, I've been trying to learn to jump in with Carol and help out in whatever way I can. Sanding a piece of wood frame, or helping cut out artwork for one of her collages, help me feel useful and her feel loved by me.

It may not be spectacular, but the High Romance really can begin with something as inconsequential as a pair of scissors or piece of sandpaper.