Afterall ...

Afterall …

I just wanted to tell you I love you … that I have always loved you and that I probably will always love you. I know we have only been in this new place for a short time (how long has it been?) and yet I feel I must write this letter to let you know my true feelings for you …

I want to tell you I love you in slow motion … as we eat a meal together on a cloud of golden puffy pillows. I want to tell you again as we dance in the air for the first time … alone and yet surrounded by beautiful blue angels. I want to hold your hand tightly as we float together over forest and skyscrapers to watch the mere humans below us sleeping through their night. And I want to tell you over and over again as we dream together, in our quiet embrace of eternity…

I know we have never quite met and yet, in a way I am sure you could love me as much as I love you. Ours would be a delicious love, like wild honey licked clean from your fingers or warm liqueur in good coffee - made here and brought to earth for all to see and to share …

The first time I saw you it was that Sunday in the rain. It so seldom rains here. You were standing near the entrance doors as the families were leaving. You shook hands with a tall man … I know he did not mean a lot to you by the way you took his hand slowly, carefully in your own. You did not look in his eyes as you shook but at the ground and then he just walked away, not looking back, like an distant friend or brother or something … certainly not your lover or husband.

I noticed you do not wear a ring and that makes me really smile. I know some people take off their rings when they come but you do not strike me as that type. I just know you are not married.

Then I saw you again in our first group. You sat near the back beside that red haired man with the long face. You barely looked up as He spoke but I saw you peeking once in a while. We are all scared … that is nothing to be ashamed of. I am a little scared too. Afterall this is very different than what I am used too. This is, afterall, the afterall …

I saw you again at the Gates talking to the tall man about something. You looked really concerned that time. What were you talking about? I was going to approach you then and try, in my own shy way, to introduce myself. And yet I found that my wings would just not carry me in that direction … would just not take me to you … and that I why I am finally writing you this letter. This letter that I will probably never send because I am so scared that you might reject me or tell me there is someone else or laugh at me or something …

But wait! Are you getting up from your place near the stairs? Are you leaving the hall … Oh please … do not leave. I love to watch you sit and go through your books like you do … and now you are moving toward the entrance and I may not see you until when? Tomorrow? The next day? Time seems to flow here … on day into the next into the next and into the next. It is like there is no days and no nights … only time and then more time.

But wait … you are turning toward … toward … toward me! Ohhh … you are coming here … to my spot … to me! You are standing in front of me and speaking and the words, the sounds are coming from your beautiful mouth. I can barely hear you but I know you are saying the same things to me that I am saying to you. And you are smiling in the same way. And now you are reaching our your hands and your wings toward me … oh I just knew it!

I guess it is going to be great afterall isn’t it? Afterall and afterall …

Richard Hersley / Oct 27 / 2003  richard@richardhersley.com