I Never Asked - Maria McKee

It has occurred to me my love

I never asked if you would sit for me

I was so taken by you and swept away

I never asked if it would be okay

And this volume that I have drawn out

The binding wears and pages frail

Now tear between my touch

Diaphanous and whisper light

I clutch and turn with fever’d hand

And pray that I may grace you

In a way that you will somehow understand

I try my best with solemn care

To capture all I see of you, so fraught, so fair

Are my words worthy of your ways?

I ask this of myself, lo, these fanatic days

And this language making use of me

As yet may be unknown to human sound

And dwelling in the space between

With all unspoken and unseen

Unquantifiable, profound, not in, not of

Up, down, nor lost nor found

And oh, as I soften on the vine

Darkly sweet I’m held to linger

Where the beauty of the season

Turns from gold to bitter grey

And oh, what aching colors you have spun

Around me where the grinding hum of sameness

Held me just above

Where I kept my heart at bay

Where I kept my heart at bay

Until, against my will

It chose to languish here upon your face

I kept this dove cupped in my palm

I spit blood upon the pearl the grey the white

Thrown back into the yawning flame

To flash and mold a crucible of my device

And what figure comes forth from the molten pit?

A form hath shone by mine own hand, my eye

Captured on a linen sprung

And taut and stretched and ready rip’t

With gentle strokes and longing writ

And wrought with fits and fainting

And YOU, sweet phantom of my making

And oh, as I soften on the vine

Darkly sweet I’m held to linger

Where the beauty of the season

Turns from gold to bitter grey

And oh, what aching colors you have spun

Around me where the grinding hum of sameness

Held me just above

Where I kept my heart at bay

Where I kept my heart at bay

Until, against my will

It chose to languish here upon your face

It has occurred to me my love

I never asked if you would sit for me

I was so taken by you and swept away

I never asked if it would be okay

I never asked if it would be okay