By Jeanmarie
Date: 22 September 1998

Hands On. Hands Off.

Like tepid water cascading through my fingers
your temperamental emotions ebb and flow,
never quite filling the half-empty tidepools of my heart.
Red hot passion flows from your right hand
only to be removed by the coolness of the left.
People are like that sometimes,
never quite here, never only there.
They just are.  Complex, feeling, inclimate
beings of habit, driven by a need all their own,
fueling unquenched fires that rage within
by whatever means they are able to.
I know this, understand the need.
The pain of my knowledge cuts to the quick
because no matter how long and deep
I reach out to you, into you, with either
right or left hand, you may never
reach back to me, and, that is my pain.  
Mine.  
Alone.