I Don’t Think I Can Love

I don’t think I can love

Like I used to.

I’ve become jaded.

I would like someone to penetrate my walls.

I would like someone to peer into my heartache

And draw from it something choice.

 

But, there is some resistance in me.

I cannot, as it were,

Draw happiness from another person.

It’s impossible.

It does not come from the self, either.

Where does happiness come from?

 

I suppose it comes from a clean conscience,

Knowing we had not done wrong.

I cannot have that,

So I look for the palliative of a wife’s mouth

To sooth me, both with her kisses and her kind words.

We all desire to be loved.

Each of us.

It is why dogs make wonderful pets

Because we enjoy the enthusiasm of the animal

Always wanting to be near us.

Cats, too, that they are exclusive

And we do not have to feel jealous of our friends

When they come by.

Horses are great pets because they are bigger than us

And teach us to overcome our fear; we tame them

Who can easily overpower us.

So much trust is needed for a horse

That the animal can kill you at any moment

But you still overpower it with force of intellect.

 

The cattle skip in the field

The fish loaf about, happy to eat and be big.

The birds sing their melodies.

Animals are such a wonderful kine

To the human soul.

I would like to define kine

As family. It means “Cattle Herd”

But we, ourselves as a family,

Are like cattle that roam here and there

Following our families to hither and thither.

We are kine, and I would like to have a blessed kine

Of loved ones;—which gets me back to why I need a wife.

I want my little pack of children to run about

And keep me company until I am old.

I want a cat, a dog and a horse.

I want a wife who is loyal, loving and affectionate.

It’s amazing how this cliche want is in every dating profile.

Yet, how many of us are deserving of love?

I’ve thought back to my crimes in youth

And see myself committing felonies.

I say to myself, “It is this reason I do not deserve love,

“But could I please be forgiven for it

“As the gospel promises?”

The answer comes to me,

But in my heart is could be either “Yes” or “No.”

I lean more toward the “No”.

It is why I’m afraid.

Not of death, just of living.

Life scares me, as it is an impending obelisk of looming catastrophe.

I cannot get a reign on it

Because some force greater than my will does not let me.

Who that is, I cannot know.

 

So I wish for a wife, children,

What I see is obstacle after obstacle

Preventing me from obtaining my earthly award.

Which I say “Award” not “Reward”

Because it was not earned.

How can I earn anything with such depths of sin?

Hidden to myself, maybe?

I do not know.

If there is any sin hidden from my eyes

I cannot know, but I want to awaken from the possibility

And live in the reality that other men take for granted.

Not speculate on all my past crimes

That never were committed

Because of two flagrant ones in youth.

 

But, back to the meditation.

I want a wife. Plain and simple.

And I will get one. Either here

Or in the afterlife.