For "Her."
Shall a heart incandescent with love be
Consumed by hate? Must one choke the other –
Torment equaling passion’s quantity –
‘Til embers of desire are smothered;
Expiring sans wisp, ash, smoke, or rack –
Token corporeal to signify
Its extinction? Ignored, fervor turns black,
Eclipsing all that light once beautified.
Respect died in a doppelganger’s eye;
Could I not see myself mirrored in him?
Recalling what might have been magnified
My grief, but catharsis yielded freedom.
Two decades lost
can never be regained,
Though affection lives again unconstrained.