Forgive Me for all the times I…by Dean Chicquette

Forgot to look into your eyes
As if I was meeting you for the first time
Or not leaning over really close
To catch your every word
Nor enjoying the warmth of you
Snuggling up within my space
And forgetting
You just want to be near

Yes, I have ignored you taking time out of your living
To enjoy my life
Forgive my hearing your story
As an addendum to mine
Or ignoring your touch
As if it were out of time
And my clamoring to be seen
When I forgot your face

I heard your pain and saw your tears
But hid my tears for shame
Forgive me for turning my music up so loud
I could not hear myself much less
Seeing your dancing to my tune
And see your oneness dressing my loneliness
For so trying to get noticed
I let slip the opportunity to notice you

I have counted my own breaths
Forgetting why I breathe
Even how I breathe
Watching your story unfold
I was too busy to see it
How it fit with mine
Then you touch me again
Ignoring the past

Forgive me for letting you
Experience the dark
All alone
Lost in it
And my not even shouting in
Nor listening for an echo
Broken by your call
Broken by your whimper

And most of all
Forgive me for not loving you

Dedicated to the Christ who has walked with me in the form of Linda now for 53 years on her 76th birthday.

I love you, Linda!