Writing About Love: 2024

Gifts Of Christmas

1.

A gift,
For me?
Oh you shouldn’t have!

Is it really a selfless expression of your affection?
A gesture of love?
Or an obligation?

Is it genuine?

Does your gift reflect who you think I am?
Who you think I should be?
Perhaps it’s more about who you are,
Who you want me to think you are.

Is it an object of serious intention?
Designed to awaken?
To arouse?
To cause a reaction?
Or is it just for fun,
A playful reminder of the inner child?

Am I taking this too seriously?
Giving too much thought
To what is impersonal?
Is it merely generic?
A gift that says:
We are not close.

Did you wrap it yourself?
With your best paper?
Or was it the tail end of your least favorite roll,
Reserved for those who do not matter?

Have you actually touched this present,
Or did someone else purchase and wrap it for you?
Did it come by mail from a warehouse?

2.

Will those I love most
Disappoint me with thoughtlessness,
Or will I bask in the warmth of their intentions,
However artfully or clumsily conveyed?

Will my more slow-witted relatives
Prove true to my expectations?
Will the superior intelligence of others
Be clearly demonstrated
And make me feel stupid
For the lack of imagination my gifts reveal?

Will the ego of the gift-giver
Overshadow the generosity of the gift?
Or will the giver’s inferiority complex be manifest,
So sadly displayed by the soullessness of what is given?

Will the gift be of use, of value,
Or merely a cheap trifle soon discarded,
Donated to the local thrift shop?

Perhaps the most important gift of all will be absent,
The gift from the one I love most.

Or perhaps after all the wrapping is cleared away,
When the communal ceremony has ceased
And the gift-givers dispersed,
I will steal away to some private place
And press my lips to the gift I treasure above all,
Its meaning so fervently constructed,
Without form.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Always

How will you grow old my princess?
How long will your youthful elegance endure?

I would have you impervious,
Fearlessly facing mirrors,
Accepting the inevitable,
Fueled by grace,
By joy,
Knowing in your heart of hearts
There is one who will always see
The beautiful young woman you are,
Will always be.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

This Flower

I give you this flower,
Individual,
Containing all flowers,
Containing all my love,
Which cannot be contained.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Confession

All the knowledge
I have so carefully gathered
For so many years,
All my opinions,
My experiences,
Achievements,
All that I am
Means so very little
Compared to the touch of your hand,
The sound of your voice,
Confessing love.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Where Will It End?

You’ve learned so much,
The methods,
The craft of attracting men.

Skillfully applied color,
The revealing cut of your clothes,
The shape and fall of your hair,
Each finger,
Each toe,
Perfect.

Your scent,
The arc and pace of your walk,
The lingering glance,
Just long enough to say:
“I am full of mystery.”

How long will you keep this up?

Look at these aging frumpy women,
So unhappy with what they thought they wanted.
What have they surrendered?

Look at their disappointed, disinterested husbands,
Men who invested their lives in illusion,
Now so brazenly inattentive.

Now ask yourself,
What do you really want and what does it mean?
Where will it end?

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

If Only I Could

If only I could give you the joy in my heart,
If all I had to do was place my hand on your shoulder,
Look into your eyes and smile.

If I could give you the joy in my heart
By doing these things,
Then I would come to you now,
Interrupt everything,
Announce to the world:
You, are loved!
Saying it over and over again
Until you finally believed it,
Until you finally believe it,
Until you are filled with love,
Cleansed,
Healed,
Ready to begin again.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Blinding White Light

This blinding white light
Is paralyzing.
I've forgotten who I am.
I don’t know what I want.
I’m filled with a wistful panging of pleasure.
I'm wracked with uncertainty.

What is right?
What is wrong?

Only in the beginning
This tempest.
Before things are settled.
Before decisions are made.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

The Clearing

Yes,
I know,
These words are not enough
To describe the longings of the heart,
To diminish the entanglements of our lives
That too often strangle our finer emotions.

These words are not enough.

We need to find our way
To a clearing in the forest,
To walk into the light with arms outstretched,
To remember.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Falling

I pause for a moment,
Breathe deeply,
And try to consider my infatuation for you
In the cold, clear-headed light of reason,
And at last
I begin to see you as just another person.

I watch you from a distance
And see that you are not unlike others
Who come and go within my gaze
Without stirring my emotions so.

Then you see me and say hello.

I come closer and take your hand,
Look into your eyes,
And all reason disappears.

No direction,
No gravity,
No time of day,
Falling, falling, falling.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Shared

I was in a sunny summer meadow

Filled with extravagantly colored butterflies
Moving too fast to catch,
Streaking rainbow colors in their wake,
Yet still I tried.

Crows came,
Perched just out of reach,
Taunting me with head-bobbing caw, caw, caws.
Triplets.

I hunkered down in the tall grass,
Spying,
Chirping in imitation of the sparrows
Alighting on the grass,
Probing the damp soil.
They saw me and burst into flight.

The warm sunlight felt good on my back,
Such a long winter.
I stretched every muscle,
Watched the pulsing shadows of wind-tossed leaves,
And awoke,
Stirring the calico cat on my lap from sleep
Who chirped awake from the dream we shared.

~ Russ Allison Loar

What Love Is Like

I am lying in a yellow field,
An endless summer day
With nothing to do,
Cradled by the gentle tugging of this earth.

I am alone,
Home is near,
A hawk soars and falls,
Someone I love
Calls.

I am running through golden stalks of wheat
As fast as I can,
My feet leave the ground,
I rise and catch the wind,
I am flying.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Into The Heart

When we meet,
Something awakens in her,
Something glows.
She is translucent.

Her smile comes easy and lingers.
She feels the urge to stretch and arches her back,
Tossing her long auburn hair to one side
Of her bare, sculptured shoulders,
Flashing her dark, penetrating eyes,
Looking long and deep into mine,
Weaving her articulate fingers through the coils of her hair,
Inviting me.

She ties a blue and white scarf around her forehead
And becomes someone else,
Showing she can be beautiful in so many ways.

Her burnished olive skin filters the light
And I touch her cheek.

Something ancient and eternal now guides us
Into the heart of night.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

I Imagine

I imagine she is reading these words.
I imagine she loves me still.
I imagine she really did love me,
And so I forgive all mistakes,
For I too made so many.
I imagine she wants to be forgiven.

I imagine she has forgiven me.
I imagine she remembers the best part of me,
The best part of us.
I imagine she is learning to let small things
And hard feelings
Go.

I imagine I really did love her.
I imagine I love her still.

I imagined her then,
I imagine her now.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Old Places

I go back to our old places,
Searching for you,
So young and silly,
Before the weight of the world dampened your laughter,
Before entanglements,
When consequences held little power over spontaneity.

So much of our lives were about beginnings,
About an imaginary future.

Well, here we are in that future,
So abstract then,
So fixed in place now,
This accumulation of time
Where remembrance overwhelms imagination.

Here we are,
You and I,
Still together,
Yet I go back to our old places,
Searching for you,
Searching for me.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Never Far

When love embraces trust,
I slowly surrender my polished persona
And show my scars,
Even those self-inflicted,
Especially those self-inflicted.

Yes,
I too am a human being,
I say.

The wounded child,
Never far from the surface.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

The Parting

And where is home?
You wonder,
When home and family fall apart
And you’re starting over again,
Driving down darkened streets
That lead to this new place
You hesitate to call home,
Unpacking boxes,
Wondering what kind of logic
Will help you decide
Where old possessions should go.

You cradle a music box,
The first gift.
Too expensive,
Your mother said.
On its lid a portrait
Of two rosy-cheeked children
Sharing a single umbrella,
And you remember all the rainy days
You both walked and walked,
Just to be in motion together.

How young your hearts
In a world so dull and indifferent,
Changed for a while.
The world spreads out before you now
Like a desert,
This new world that seemed so right
In the fever of your white-hot rage,
That seems so blank,
Alone.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Older Men

Older men want to be young again
So they fall in love with beautiful young girls,
Believing they can again be new,
Undetermined,
Free from the consequence of years,
Reborn.

Forgive them.
This is their last adolescence.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

A Place In Your Heart

There is a place in your heart
No one has shared,
A garden filled with a solitary beauty
Only you can see.

Your life is a waking dream,
Entranced,
Without words,
Searching,
Still hoping someone will come
Who will see what no one else has seen,
Who will know without knowing
That you are the one.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

The Things We Do When Love Is Gone

The things we do when love is gone,
The things we buy,
The things we eat
When love is given up,
The way we face the world,
The way we speak
When love no longer calls,
The things that must be done,
The order that we seek
When love falls apart,
The road we take,
The convictions we make
To shun the lure,
To escape the hook,
The ugly way we look
And feel
When love’s no longer real.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

An Apple Or An Orange

I could not decide
Whether to buy an apple
Or an orange,
And the harder I tried
The more I realized
Just how bad I feel
About you
And me.

Just pick up one or the other,
I told myself,
Or both,
What does it matter?

I walked out of the store
With nothing.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Home Sings

Home sings
In the rattle, clang and clamor
Of kitchen song,
In the cat claw scratching
On the back porch door,
In the vacuum drone humming,
In the going,
In the coming,
In the laughter, shout and hurry,
In the fuss,
In the fury of everyday life,
Home sings
With irregular rhythms of slamming doors,
The sizzle of water in sudden streams
From faucets, showers and various machines,
Home sings
With assorted shoes on linoleum floors
Tapping out a dance of a thousand chores,
A pan in the oven bangs with the heat,
Home sings,
Phones ring,
Doors knock,
A key in the lock,
You give me a hug
And the music begins:
The refrigerator is whirring,
The cats are all purring,
Our children are playing
And my heart is saying
Listen closely
To the song life brings,
We are safe,
We are happy,
Home sings.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Somewhere There Is A Boy

Somewhere there is a boy
Dreaming of a horse,
A horse of his own,
A chestnut stallion,
A part of his soul,
A horse he would ride
Through fields and meadows,
Through shadowed woods,
A horse he would greet each morning,
Spend all day with,
Kiss goodnight.

Somewhere there is a boy
Dreaming of horse,
A horse like the one I see here,
Standing in a muddy pen,
Looking wistfully out at me
As I walk by,
This horse,
Alone all day long,
Dreaming of a boy.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

To Love Or Not To Love

All the reasons,
Why,
Why not,
All the emotions,
Why,
Why not,
All the confusion,
Yes,
No,
All the passion,
Yes,
No,
All the talking,
All the thinking,
The wishing,
The hoping,
The anxiety,
The fear,
The lust,
The guilt,
The despair,
The depression,
The dark,
The light,
The color of the sun,
The color of the sky,
Immortality,
Death,
Resignation,
Saturation,
Obsession,
Exhaustion,
Defeat,
Mourning,
Change,
Strategy,
Luck,
Fate.

Why?
Why not?
Yes,
No,
Yes,
No,
No,
No,
Absolutely no!

Yes.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

The Clock Strikes Three

The sound of an old clock,
The rhythm of the pendulum,
The striking of a tiny hammer
Against a metal coil.
The lonely hours after midnight.

The memory of your touch,
Warm,
Gentle, yet firm,
Hungry.
You penetrate my soul.

The clock strikes three.
I am wide awake with longing
For your fingers on my skin.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

No Longer Young

In moments of great pain
I think of you so young,
The first time our unclothed bodies touched,
Pressed and rubbed together
In the satin sea of my small bed,
A secret in my parents’ house.

It was the first time I felt
The length, the breadth, the depth,
The full measure of myself,
Alive, awake and rippling through every pore.

Look, look what time has done!
I awoke this morning,
No longer young.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Absence

A broken heart is hard enough,
To discover you are unloved after all,
That all those words of love were false,
At best a mistake of the emotions,
At worst a manipulative lie.

A broken heart is hard enough,
But there is healing in seeing things clearly,
In forgiveness,
In forgetting.

A broken heart is hard enough,
The price love can demand,
But the absence is harder still
And does not end.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

The Phone Call

You called me,
A matter of fact phone call,
A small practical matter
Which could not be misconstrued
As anything else,
Could it?

Because I was paralyzed with joy
To hear your voice
And wanted no damage to our friendship,
I could not say anything
Outside of the socially acceptable,
Even less than I might have said
If I did not love you.

After the last formality was exchanged,
The polite liturgy concluded,
I said goodbye
And waited,
But did not hear your voice.

Did we say goodbye simultaneously,
Each hearing only our own voice?
Did you hang up?
I did not hear the connection break.

I stayed on the line,
Listening,
Wondering if you were listening too,
Afraid to speak,
Afraid to hang up,
So lonely in the growing dark of the evening,
Listening for the sound of breathing.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Rapture

I could say,
You awaken something eternal in me,
The ineffable heart of God,
Resuscitated,
Pulsing through every pore,
Deafening,
Blinding,
Revelatory.

I could invent a dozen different ways
To describe how you make me feel,
How I make myself feel when I am with you.

But when we meet,
Words fall away
And all is rapture.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Whole

When you touch me,
Although we are not yet lovers,
When you touch me,
Though we have not known each other long,
When you touch me,
Although you have not said "love,"
When you touch me,
When you take my hand,
Something fits.

Something that was alone,
Wandering,
Is home,
Whole.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

All I Can Say

Infatuation is easy,
The words pour from my pen.

But lonely desperate love,
Love you can’t live without,
Yet love denied,
That kind of love is hard to write down.

That’s all I can say.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Without Words

I am afraid to tell you,
Afraid to say it out loud,
Afraid to write it down,
For you may not feel the same way
And my words may place a barrier between us.

Right now,
We are friends,
And whether our friendship is a beginning,
An ending,
Or something else,
I am afraid I would lose your friendship
By telling you,
By saying it out loud,
By writing it down.

When I see you today
I will smile,
I will look deep into your eyes,
I will do my best to let you know,
Without words.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Better

The Craft

You’ve learned so much about the methods,
The craft of attraction,
The skillful application of color and blush,
A certain tilt of your head combined with a certain expression,
How the light catches flecks of jade in your eyes,
The cut, curl and fall of your auburn hair,
Muscular with elasticity,
Casually filtering but not completely concealing
Your expertly-timed penetrating glance,
Lingering just long enough to send the message:
“I am full of mystery.”

Oh if he knew how much time you’ve spent on your nails,
Let alone your cuticles,
Each individual eyelash,
The selection and strategic application of scent,
Your shoes,
The golden ring with the prismatic amber glass,
The balance of accessories,
A level of detail beyond his conscious awareness.

He’s more interested in the revealing cut of your clothes,
The shape and texture of your skin,
Your similarity to the lovely young women on magazine covers,
The effectiveness of his charm,
His ability to make you laugh,
The image of himself he wants you to believe,
He wants to believe,
Verification.

You’ve learned that the magic lies beneath awareness,
In the poking and the prodding of subconscious stimuli.

I watch your performance with awe and inspiration,
Experienced enough,
Old enough now to catch a flashing glimpse of the child,
Still there,
Wondering if anyone can see the uncertainty behind the mask.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Today Is Her Birthday

Reasons

There are plenty of reasons
Why not,
But they all vanish
At the thought of your touch.

All we have in this life
Are moments,
And another moment with you
Is reason enough.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

When The Dream Dies

Bliss

You will not let yourself fall in love,
Considering the complete impracticality of the situation.
You will be self-disciplined and wise
And never know bliss,
So brief and troublesome.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Wounds

Some wounds never heal.

The transgressions of youth,
The persistence of folly,
The weakness of moral resolve,
These are painful in remembrance.

The stubborn refusal to admit mistake,
The inability to yield and in such yielding change behavior.
O yes, maturity has come slow,
In fits and starts,
So easily suspended when truly tested.

These wounds are painful to the touch
But the pain does not go deep.

Some wounds never heal.

The loss of a loved one,
The cruelty of suffering,
The arrogance of evil.
These are constant in this world
And penetrate the core of my being.

I would seek an end to this pain,
Yet such an end would require forgetfulness.
I will not erase those I have loved,
Those I have lost,
For they are of my own soul now,
Of my spirit,
My essence.

This is the price I pay
For living in this imperfect world.

Some wounds never heal.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

When The Change Comes

When the change comes,
I watch the rise and fall of your chest
And feel your breath within me.

When it comes,
You run your fingers through your hair
And my fingers tremble,
Your hand becomes my hand.
You reach under the neck of your blouse
To scratch your shoulder
And I feel the bone
Beneath your skin.

When it comes,
You move restlessly in your chair,
Propping elbows on knees,
Stretching the contours of your back
And I embrace you.
I feel the tension of your ribs
Pressing against mine,
Though I sit across the room
And do not know your name.

When it comes,
I cannot stop you from leaving this room
Where I am required to stay
And listen to the words of unimportant people
Who are old and ugly
And starved for love,
Like me.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

The Magnificent Illusion

Your hand touches mine,
An accident,
And your electricity surges into me.

You say something ordinary
And look into my eyes,
Explaining,
And I am entranced,
Barely listening.

You laugh and smile
And do a hundred different things
You do every day,
All day long,
Without thinking.

But when I am with you,
Everything you do is illuminated,
Inspiring,
Divine.

O the magnificent illusion of love.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

A Language

The mind says,
Listen to me, I will explain everything.

The heart says,
I understand, but my feelings are unchanged.

The mind says,
This is God and this is life,
All is explained.

The heart says,
I speak a language you do not understand,
A language without words.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved

Parallel Lust

There may be an infinite number of alternate realities,
According to some theories.
For each of us,
An infinite number of individual existences,
One for each possible action,
Each possible outcome.

And so my love,
Despite your current disinterest in my affections,
You may be my ardent lover in some other life
Where I am the reluctant one,
Though I suspect my eagerness will persist
With all the beautiful yet reluctant women I know,
Each destined to become my consummated soul mate
In some of my more salacious autobiographies.

Meanwhile,
In this particular lifespan,
The unremarkable aspects of my love life,
Continue.

~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved