From Swan to Shadow

FROM SWAN TO SHADOW

by Layla Skramstad and Gary Jurechka
-(collaboration poem)

Love is as fleeting...
as the remnants of a vague dream,
something you can almost reach out
and touch, a sweet feathery feeling
to love, appearances are superficial
to love, it is the heart that matters.

The quintessential beauty
of the first wistful smile,
the first alluring embrace,
the first yearning kiss,
the first feelings of shy attraction
as eyes meet and stars collide
as we slowly grow to know one another.

There is no feeling on earth or heaven above,
like falling in love, like being in love.

But somethings aren't always meant to last,
like a shadow swallowed by night's cold blackness,
love can mournfully fade away, a slow death,
an intense pain of heartbreak, with no understanding
of just when and how and why this could happen.

Thus this loss, this blackness of despair and devastation,
the caving in of the unforeseen, a gasping emptiness
leaving us to walk away, afraid to look back,
without a last word, without a last touch, only tears,
when love is suddenly extinguished like a dead flame,
and you are left lost in emptiness,
a heart shattered, a murder of one.

The last kiss lingers, stolen before the fall,
bittersweet and haunting, an agonizing loneliness
burning unbearably in your memories and dreams as you lay
curled up inside the walls of your aching heart.

A dark corner of despair
where hope can't hurt you anymore.
And this, this is the risk you take...for Love.
The only thing you have to decide is...is it worth it?

...And, only the heart can answer that.