In the Beginning.

I stand on the fire escape

of my second story walkup

and stretch my soul to the stars.

I can do no less, for the city surrounds me,

and my love calls nameless to me.

I wait on the tip of the highest mountain of dreams and the Milky Way beckons; so far, so close.

If I never reach it,

yet still I have not buried my dreams

in the sands of disillusion

Nor do I wade in the gutter of ignorance.

My lover stretches his heart to me

and holds me by threads of time,

Unseen, but strong as molded iron.

He watches from his own pinnacle of desire

and waits, hoping his stars are also mine.

If they are not, and I fall from this soaring cloud,

I will have farther to fall than most.

But better to fall trying to reach the clouds
than die never having climbed at all.