Keepsakes Poem by Whit Leyenberger

Without you here I cannot have you.
Minds replace absence with memories,
inconstant images reeling on a sepia screen.
And as remembrances fade
missing or dissipating sections are restored,
logical generation of what may as well be
Spectacled curators patching diffusing canvasses.

It’s hard to have someone.
We are so liquid, brief,
anchoring ourselves to passing ships.
Sometimes your eyes held me
as if trying to prepare a memory,
embalming me for long term storage
though I was not yet gone or going.

Know with your bones
that for several blooming moments
you were loved more than everlasting sunrise,
more than tickling rain or the public library.
You were loved more than sun freckles or bottomless sledding hills
more than childhood passion or creation
or God’s forgiveness even
Anything that momentarily wafted through this fanatical imagination.

I loved you more than the promise of a goddess,
you’ve taught me imperfection’s divinity.
Laughing compassion is the road to supple places
Submission to silliness is ineffable wisdom
soft enough to be held in the hands of God.

No matter how we change
this can never be taken from you
I will always have loved you more than anything
my language might constrict
or time’s erosion would neglect
Gifts already given can never be revoked

You are a pinnacle of graceful imperfection
Far more complete than artificial muses
composed with the wanderings of an idle imagination
half stewed disparate desires, words
You are woven in real
tiny deposits of radiance
often taken for granted

In all, an entity too combustibly living
to have in mind, so
Without you here I cannot have you