Waiting for you on a winter night

I long for you like
night longs for sunrise.
I sit by a dying fire in
a dark room, an old
flannel quilt, half-torn,
thrown over my bare
shoulders. The darkness,
signifying emptiness–
the kind of emptiness
which can fill your whole
mind–reminds me of
you.

You are daybreak, stepping
across the threshold with
the sun in your arms,
singing some old threshing song
that peasants used to sing at harvest,
when being human was
simpler and grander, a song
full of jolly nonsense
signifying the full radiance
of a well-lived life. You
thunder down the stairs,
and ask me to come
to breakfast.