(for Bryan Christopher Smith)
he is
sum total of everything
I have already written
on loving
ask me how I know
and sense
the assurance of a mother
who recognizes
the scent and twinkle
of her first born
when multitudes of tots
dart their brashness
past first day of school
exit bells
run out be claimed
by air and expectancy
and find their most beloved
who claims
with the extension of arms
and with reciprocal knowingness:
that one is mine
he is my sum total
the embodiment
of brilliant possibility
and claiming that everything
that could be
is here and ready to become
this present moment:
the exchange of rings
a commitment ceremony
mappings of deferred dreams
the topography of shared tomorrows
the fulfillment of landscape,
of this home we've been building
all our lives
perhaps unknowingly
through the ware and tear
of past heart-hurt
i am his sum total
something more firm
than visionary volitions
and realizing too late
that it was never meant
for anyone
to believe in love
alone
that faith must be shared
and so when really real?
we wake with the confidence
that every plus and minus
every approximation of perfection
each exponent of faith
seeming to subtract
hopes to increase love itself,
the probability of a lifetime
have been waiting
for now
so for the first time
we do not adore this way alone
do not claim and write
and dream
we've found it
alone
do not fall too fast alone
ask me how i know?
and I'll tell you to call him
look at him
speak with him
hear the passion-tremor
of a man as bold
as any challenge or caution
that this is not real
or will not work out
has not been given time enough
look at him
see in his eyes
anything that suggests
everything he has worked for
every pain he has endured
is not the calculus
of his most lucid dream
of a lifetime with his sum total
ask him how he knows
i am good for him so soon?
he'll ask
if you get anything different
from me
beyond the symmetry of knowing
true loves will always follow their hearts
so our families and friends
will have to get over themselves
overcome their precautions and anxiety
and understand
there are dreamers
who keep dreams hostage to fear
and those who damn the dream
and do the damn thing
in this case
we found each other
so celebrate that with us
ask him how he knows
ask him if this poem
is nothing less
than my vow of faith
to be, stay, abide
with nothing less
than the sum-total
of all past belief
that I am worthy of the best things
and am finally realizing
that at the end of the day
I am one who wants to know
I was brave enough to brave the risk
again
that I will never "do me" differently
and
those who know me
simply know
go’head, ask them how they know
and they'll say
"that damn boy is at it again"
with a smile as gracious
as the one I hold
in the presence of my sum-total
