Valley

We wander and trip between the trees,
Lost in the silence of the breeze;
Walking within the valley of lies,
Right beneath their judging eyes.
The moon’s light guides the way,
Hidden within the shadow play;
Snow falls in sheets around us
As we follow our well-worn trust -
And as they wait for our final fall,
I wait for you to answer my call.

Steeper and steeper we still stumble
Over fallen branches of this jungle;
Every step is designed to stagger,
Yet you skip along with a swagger
Holding your hand to me in peace,
Your shining eyes failing to cease.
Slowly we move nearer the truth,
Hope building with aging youth;
Soon we come to an empty clearing,
The end to which you have been steering.

There we embrace for an endless age,
Writing the last lines of our page,
So yellow and torn from the past:
A fool was I to think it would last?
“Old romantics are dead and gone,”
You whisper like a sing-along,
“Where do you now go from here?”
You ask in a voice filled with fear.
And I reply hoping you will see,
“In this valley we are free.”

Your responding tear says more
Than any words you uttered before,
And all I am left with as you depart
Are snowy footprints we left at the start.
One-by-one, staring eyes leave
Content with seeing what they always believed -
An inevitable end to a shock romance
That began with a stroke of happy chance.
Blinded by faith and belief in love,
I always thought that would be enough.