Reworking an old piece for Saint Valentine…

When I was a boy I dreamt of you daily, when I was 20 I thought I knew you,
as I fall into 40 I fear we’ve never met, but I’ve loved you, you know,
since childhood, since I saw what it meant to hold someone’s hand
and since I came to understand what that touch could bring.
I’ve spoken to you, daily, not sure if you ever heard,
but I’ve told you, over and over, all the plans 
I’ve made for us in my head, all alone,
sometimes I spoke to you silently
as I lay in the wrong arms,
in the wrong bed, fallen
on the wrong path.
I have married you,
again and again, in fairy tales
and formal attire, in far off castles
and sun kissed shores. I’ve made love to you,
moved in with you, moved the world for you and yet,
although we’ve never met, you’ve changed a lot over time,
with each day, along each year, through the ages that I’ve dreamt you in.
You are no more the God I once dreamt you to be with chiseled jaw and perfect pose.
No, you are now to me, at last, more man than myth; more meaningful than mystical, more substance than surface. I too am now man, having grown older and wiser and learned to distinguish
all that is necessary from all that is just noise. When I was but a boy I dreamt of you daily,
one bounteous bodily being of beauty, but now, all is different, I have seen the world
beyond dreams, and have felt all that life pulsing through my waking hands.
I have seen how dreams can deceive you, how gods can grieve you,
and so now, with eyes open, I see part of you in many
and none of you in some and I’ve accepted
that I’ll never find all of you in one.

Words and Photographs by Damien B. Donnelly