A Poem Upon Approaching Retirement

We began,
arms linked together,
a metaphor of souls
as closely joined.
Processing, our destiny
wrapped in mystery,
our dreams and goals
loosely defined to
building a life,
a family,
yet to be revealed.

Folksong beginnings,
“Kisses Sweeter Than Wine” lives,
our children,
surprise adventures,
forays into adolescent angst,
parent and child
blindly, mutually
seeking our destiny,
together, apart, together
touching, testing, peering
ever so carefully
our existential place
within metaphysical timelessness,
the wrested restlessness
of the finite present in mystery.

Marriage is at best
a paradoxical sacrament.
The sought after
life of unity
only to be attained,
not at the time
of witnessed vows,
but at the end of life.
“What God has joined”
pulled apart by children,
by work, by survival,
it is only now
we begin to learn
the experience of
living and sleeping together.

My love,
though our bodies
may be battered,
beaten by genetics,
by illness, accident,
and neglect,
our souls remain united,
joined together
on the ontological
journey into eternity.
Beautiful as ever,
you remain the center
of my being, the
greatest experience
and expression of
Eternal Love.

(c) 2019, Robert Charles Wagner. All rights reserved.