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REGARDLESS OF TIME 1967 - 2017

ARTHUR ROBERT GOSHIN

This book is a celebration of the wondrous life that Renee and I have lived together over the last 50 years.

All of the poems, except one, have appeared in previous books of mine. The accompanying floral photos were all taken as reflections off of a distressed metal surface that I use, and I view them as complimentary visual poetics.

The photos of Renee and I are not in an exact chronological order.

Other Poetry by Arthur Robert Goshin: One Hundred and Twenty Four Moons Longing Before Dawn Love’s Cloth Both The Harvest And The Seed Time Changes Nothing The Strange Curiosity of Memory Always Searching for Me Keeper Of Memories A Gate Opens

Book Design: Parkway Digital

For Renee, My Bride The Love, Joy, And Wonder Of My Life

What do I care for the perfect dawn or blue and sun filled skies? It is always dark night for me without seeing the morning in your eyes.

REGARDLESS OF TIME It is a constant wonder to me. How I remain inexplicably pulled so strongly to you. Some fundamental force of nature for which there seems to be no counter force. You might think that such emotions would have been carried away by an unanticipated breeze due to time and circumstance. But the opposite seems to be true. That time has only strengthened that bond. So, know that you are always safe here in my heart, regardless of time.

THE PHOTOGRAPH The photo is a bit blurry. It is 50 years old after all, and I guess it does qualify as an antique. There we are, June 16, 1967. You so very sweet, exquisitely beautiful, wearing that adorable sailor dress, and me in a black suit, the one you always say was the one I wore at my Bar Mitzvah. On our way to downtown Buffalo for the civil ceremony 2 months before our Jewish wedding in New York with family and friends. How young we were, you just 3 weeks past twenty, me recently twenty one. The faith and confidence we must of had in ourselves and in each other then, the belief that our love would be sufficient to bind us together forever and ever. Such youthful perfection of wisdom and judgment!!

SACRIFICE They had both come to understand that a selfless willingness to sacrifice oneâ€™s own needs, desires, and preferences to oneâ€™s other is what gives love its most special meaning.

DEFYING GRAVITY While I had always thought that the flame of desire would burn down on lifeâ€™s wick with advancing age, it seems that mine and its intimate companion, passion, seem committed to defying natural gravity, hovering weightlessly above as the possibilities of love lead me on.

LOVERS’ MANIFESTO Be constantly open to the wonder of love. Do not be satisfied with the routine of routine. Be adventurous, finding new ways to express your love. Every day tell your lover that they are adored and cherished. Every day. Ignore inadvertent fallibility. When in doubt --- talk. Dream, imagine ways of being together. Do unto your lover as you would…….

LOVE, THE GIVER Oâ€™ Love, our lips speak of your many wonders. We bask in your warmth and glory, we live for your delights, suffer your disappointments, and dwell on your mysteries. You are the giver of lifeâ€™s best moments. You are the bard of our hearts, singing to us your sweet melodies of romance and passion. We hope for the blessing of your presence within us, and graciously accept the gifts of joy you offer us each day.

ECHOES AHEAD IN TIME I want my words of love to you to endure, to echo ahead in time. So when later, tomorrow, and beyond me, you will always know of my love, hear my words, feel my emotions, sense my presence, know that I am still, and will always be, there with you.

WHAT IS LOVE? What is love? Our most intimate needs fulfilled by the other. Spiritually one not two. Your emotional needs first. I dream of you night and day. I want to be with only you. There is only you. Physical pleasures beyond comprehension, but yours first. I want to see your face as I close my eyes at night, and feel you in my arms when I awake. We are drawn to each other, to experience the full range of our shared pleasures and preferences. Your hand in mine under every moonrise. Together every morning. Sharing ideas, books, interests. â€˜How was your day?â€™, and caring. Nothing ever taken for granted. Words of love at every chance. Making your love and passion stronger each day so that it will last forever and ever.

TIME CHANGES NOTHING Even more than sixty years on, I still long to play with my yellow truck, have my milk and cookies, want my mother’s warmth and my father’s time. I still want to be the sheriff in ‘High Noon’, feel my toes in the sand, kick stones in the street. And, even after all of these years, I still yearn to relive all of our times together. Indeed, time changes nothing.

A SHARED VESSEL It is our first breaths of the coming dawn that finally cools the fire of our fevered passions. In the next moments, with fingers and bodies intertwined, we whisper our delight in being a shared vessel into which we have been able to pour all of our love and dreams.

AS TIME RUSHES AWAY As time rushes with increasing speed away from me, I frequently find myself seeking to be alive in yesterdays. There is this growing weight of guilt for not having made sure that my moments of greatest remembered and shared happiness and pleasure were not more central, frequent, dominant in my life. I had thought that that opportunities for such moments would be endless, and always there for me. …………..I held her then, so tightly to me in the night…………I could feel her breathing, the beating of her heart, the warmth and fragrance of her skin………. Moments of the most supreme intimacy, when we were just one, not two, undisturbed, as though there was nothing else in the world to do and such moments would last forever.

EACH KISS Each kiss is its own message of intimacy. We are one. I commit to you, you to me. The overture and coda of our love. The beginning and end of each encounter. It stirs what follows. Yes the lips, but not only. In our embrace, exponential passion. The kiss ignites. In parallel, each kiss magnifies. A trance of unparalleled response. Who knew? Heavenly sweetness, How could it be? The tenderness, the fusing together. Canâ€™t, wonâ€™t let go. Please, forever. Each kiss is both a promise and a promise fulfilled. We are, and will always be, bound together.

MY MUSE Muse, you are my guide. You are my inspiration. Neglect, indifference and my hands refuse to write, my mind empties, my heart calcifies, I become ignorant of joy. Doubt rules. Be careful, I am more delicate, more fragile, than you could know, than I imagined. Out of balance Iâ€™m not sure how to recapture equilibrium. I become adrift, needing to find my shore. You.

MASTER OF THE UNIVERSE Oâ€™ Master of the Universe. You have blessed me with my Beloved. For this greatest of gifts I am eternally grateful. She is the light that illuminates my path. She makes the air that I breathe new and fragrant. She feels like warm spun silk. She tastes like the sweetest of your nectars. Her face shines, her eyes sparkle with the brilliance of a million of your suns. I am humbled by your generosity.

LOVE MATTER When we are close, really close, I feel porous, permeable. As though I’m both absorbing you, and a torrent rushing to you. That our ‘love matter’ is in rapid flow. That we are freely seeping into each other across a steep gradient, with all of our senses experiencing the wonder.

MORE I want more. More time. I want to see my children and their children grow old, happy, fulfilled. To always feel the warmth and splendor of the sun, to experience all of the beauty and wonders of life. To see the end of poverty and suffering. To know that the earth is safe. To see a thousand more full moons and every sunrise and sunset in between. To help find more ways to make the world a better place. And, to always be with you, to always have you close, to share our love. Always.

A HEART’S AFFIRMATION My heart’s memory is indeed short. As it irrationally fears homelessness, it periodically seeks your affirmation. It longs for your embrace, the sweet delicacy of your lips, your ardent intent, to feel the beat of your heart against it, to know the tender eros of your touch, to hear the sirens’ call of your song, to share your heavenly passions, and to know that it remains joined with its forever other.

ALWAYS It is always the case, yes, absolutely always, that in the course of every day I can’t wait to see you, to talk to you, to be with you. To have contact of any kind. It is a constant, unquenchable, desire. That is the truth, even though I might not have said it. My guess is that you may be surprised at the ‘always’. However, when I am about to see you I’m always filled with anticipation of happiness and love. With the expectation always being surpassed by the experience, it is no wonder that I exhibit this romantic Pavlovian behavior. So today, as every day, in the spirit of ‘always’, I ask you, ‘will you always be mine?’ But know, that no matter what, I will always be yours. Always.

LOVE RACES THROUGH MY HEART Each and every day I feel the warm wind of our love race through my heart. Just as I know that desire begets desire, I see how love begets even more intense love. So, what was at first, long ago, a most gentle barely discernible breeze is now a whirlwind of such ferocity that I am swept away.

WHAT I NEED I donâ€™t need you to just love me. I need you to love me and to want me. All of the time. As I do you. Yes, both loved and desired. Anytime, all of the time.

THE CALL OF THE SIRENS How did Odysseus resist the call of the Sirens to avoid being destroyed? Because, maybe there’s a lesson for me, just in case. In case sometime in the future I need to stop this uncontrollable imperative to be drawn to your ‘call’. Not that I really want to stop, but the ‘call’ does make me confused. Oh yes, now I remember. Odysseus ordered his men to plug his ears with wax and strap him to the ship’s mast. Mmm… sure, that might work.

CRUELTY Lovemaking. One of the marvels and rewards is how you so quickly become removed from the often less pleasant realities of the world. And enter a fabulous, ethereal place of ecstatic joy. That you can revisit when your good fortune allows. But, one of lifeâ€™s cruelties is how relatively brief the journey, how quickly you are returned to the same place you started at, and how rapidly the memory of the experience fades.

YES, PLEASE CONSUME I love your hunger for me. So yes, please consume. To your heartâ€™s content. Donâ€™t stop. Not now, not ever. Know that my joy is the twin of yours. To be desired by whom you desire. To be loved by whom you love. Unabated, continually, constantly. Perfect emotional symmetry. A fully reconciled life. Heaven on earth. You are.

WHAT IF I JUST............? It’s the wind. The snow tapping against the window. Dawn is dawning. Now awake, I turn to you. You are deep in REM sleep. On your back. So still, barely breathing. Face serene, beautiful, delicious, irresistible. Lips dry, just parted, me struggling to resist. Watching, enjoying. Both your hands high up near your neck. Oh, that neck. Your contours calling me. What is the dream, am I in it? Right leg, next to me, uncovered. Mmm…oh my, my. What if I just lift the cover and….?

ON THE WINGS OF HAPPINESS O’ happiness, in the silence of this new morning I feel your wings begin to unfold and lift me upward. The sun’s first light fills my sky with smiles. A butterfly’s meandering sets a carefree route for us this day. The rising mist from the lake moistens a grateful meadow, giving hope to morning flowers. Now, let’s continue on our journey. Take me to my Love, then let her also climb upon your wings, and then take us both to those places of wonder where we need to be.

IT IS DESIRE Desire. I am propelled forward by desire. The desire for love, meaning, intimacy, knowledge, joy, creation, wisdom, inner calm, truth, happiness, a life that makes the one for others better, that extends my line forward. When I seem to obtain that which I seek the desire is only momentarily fulfilled. It is in a never ending supply. An endless cycle that anticipates a completion that never occurs. It is desire.

DANCING ON STARS Last night I dreamt that you and I were dancing on stars across the night sky. Imagine. You were wrapped in a long, white, diaphanous gown. I was in a black tux with tails and a top hat. The full moonâ€™s glow kept its spotlight on us. With each step we moved as one from star to star. You were radiant, beautiful, slightly flushed, eyes sparkling. We danced all night in each othersâ€™ arms across the galaxy, celebrating being alone, together.

SUMMER DRIFTING Well, here I am. Enjoying this day. And, why not? Alone, peaceful, in this beautiful park. Everything and everyone seems in harmony. The flowers are open, smiling, sweetening the air. The trees, the grasses are swaying and nodding to me in full agreement. The children are laughing, happy as they should be. I lean back, the sun warming my face as I start to drift into an hypnotic summer haze. I sense your presence, even from this distance. Content, my eyes close as I float into your waiting arms.

A SHARED LIFE In the sharing of a life it is often enough to just be together in the fullness of days while in the occasional pursuit of joint and individual dreams and hopes even if you never find what it was you had thought at the beginning that you had wanted. Because a shared journey of caring, intimacy, and love, is itself a life of beauty and wonder. Truly.

INTIMACY Intimacy. Love, itâ€™s about intimacy. Intimacy given, intimacy received. Mutual, simultaneous. Never withheld. The desire never diminished. Always exploring boundaries. First fulfilling the other. The tie that binds. Its prospect drives passion. The source of dreams and desires. Intimacy. Love.

LOVE CRUSH Is it really possible, at my age, after all these years? To still have the same undiminished â€˜love crushâ€™ for you? I mean such craving, unbridled desire. Such hungry yearning, such passionate longing. So gratifying, yet so unsettling. The fulfillment so quickly followed by the intense pining angst, needing yet fulfillment once again. The romantic lust, the wanton tenderness, the...., the.... . OK, OK. Yes, it definitely is possible!!

LOVE’S CLOTH Fragments, remembrances. At ocean’s edge, brilliant sun, strong breeze, strands of hair brush across your delicate, luminous face. Candlelit dinner, hand in hand, your tender smile stirs my heart. Cold winter night, walk along lake’s edge, full moon, stars, a kiss to be remembered for a lifetime. You with child, so serene, my hand, yours on mine, movement. Afternoon in bed, you asleep, nested in my arms, your soft warmth, the slow rhythm of your breathing. Your resplendent laughter, echoes of your inner joy and happiness. Through the lens, delighting in your beauty, the red rocks as background. Bed again, passion, ecstatic joy at the giving and receiving. These are fragments of cherished memories held onto by my heart, all woven together into the fullness of love’s cloth. 33

YOUR NEARNESS Your nearness. That is what I crave, most need, most want. Knowing that you are close, having you close. To hold, to see, to talk to, to be with. Close to your loving warmth, your sweetness, your tenderness, your beauty. The ready opportunity for intimacy, to affirm our love. With no regrets for time lost. The immediate chance to give as much, and much more, than I receive. Being together, undisturbed.

THE CURVE OF YOUR BACK Let me draw you close. Oh, still closer. Let me fit the curve of your back tightly to my chest. Let me taste the sweet salt on your neck from the heat of us as one. Then letâ€™s follow each other, together in our dreams. To our places of wonder and hope.

LOVE NEEDS TIME TOGETHER Love needs time together. To take root, to be nourished, to blossom. Through all seasons, through all years, through all moments. Time for words. Time for touching. Time for understanding. Time for all intimacies. Time for all passions. Time for the comfort of nearness. Time to stand in each othersâ€™ place, to know the other. Time to savor wonderment. Time to share. Time to surprise, to astonish. Time gone canâ€™t be recaptured. Take the time.

THE WOMAN YOU HAVE BECOME Be happy with the woman you have become. Your secret is that you have kept the child in the adult. Having acquired the words to express the feelings, the feelings havenâ€™t disappeared. You believe that laughter knows no end. You are constantly surprised by the wonders around you, seeing the good intent in the world. You dream, you hope. You know the warmth and delights of unconditional love given and received. Yes, be happy with the woman you have become.

ANOTHER STIRRING The afternoon has passed, night has arrived. We lie as one, catching our breath. Our heartbeats slow. I still feel your pulsing rhythm. As you move slightly, your chest strokes mine. I marvel at the grace of the curls along the back of your neck. I softly caress the erotic curves down the full length of your back. You kiss my fingers that were resting on your heated cheek. All this and your sweet fragrance creates an unanticipated stirring.....

AT THE VERY EDGE I watch. I wait. At the very edge. Just out of sight. In the fold of awareness. You sense it’s me. Coiled. Burning. Ready. My hunger ravenous. My thirst unquenchable. My desire insatiable. I don’t sleep. I must be ready. Always. For a word, a call, a sign. From you. That my time is here, is now.

MY MORNING FLOWER My morning flower. Now basking in the awakening glow. I am drawn to where your heavenly scent directs. Your delicate, pink, soft petals so serenely yield to my first touch. Then gently unfold to offer up the gifts beneath. Your honeyed nectar moistens a pathway to all delights. Why resist such temptations?

MORE ON LOVE Love craves reciprocation. Love makes hope potent. Love demands constant nurturing. Love requires shared obligation. Love is restless. Love both magnifies and obscures fault. Love is both tolerant and intolerant. Love is both patient and desperate. Love is the sustenance of meaningful life.

MY VALENTINE My Sweet Venus, your cupid has pierced my heart with a thousand arrows. The mere mention of your name sets my heart pounding, brings romantic melodies to my ears, inflames my flesh, creates expectations of passion well beyond the capacity of words to describe. I soar to the heavens in your actual presence. You are, and will always be, my one true valentine.

WATCHING I watch as you sleep. Just inches away. Your nearness warms me. Your delectable lips, slightly apart, call to mine. Eye movements under your lids, am I in the dream? Your skin, silvery in the darkness. I lift the covers to see more. The curves, erotic, I canâ€™t resist touching. You turn, I admire. I put my arm under yours and draw into you. So happy to be together as one. I drift off, with you.

LONGING BEFORE DAWN I await the dawn. Who knows what it might bring? I’m like a child the morning of their birthday. I try to levitate the sun over the treetops. The thrill of what’s next. It’s about hope, about surprise, about ‘tabula rasa’, about renewal. It’s also about how things stay connected. A continuing thread. My ‘string theory’. Yes, just before dawn I have this powerful longing, this intense anticipation. Almost uncontainable. This longing before dawn is for you, only you. Will we have real time together, and what might it be like? Will we have a chance for all intimacies? Then, if not, I know that there will always be another dawn. Tomorrow. 44

RESTING, WAITING The room is now empty, unoccupied. Soft light filters in, creating shifting shadows and shapes across the vacant bed. The forms silent, quiescent. The pillows indented, in slumber. The top sheet and blanket askew, angled to each other, peaceful. This all in stark contrast to the velocity of movement, energy, voltage, fusion, fission, of just moments ago. And so it is. Everything now resting, waiting. Until the next time.

TIME SUSPENDED We were in our own garden. Far from everywhere, far from anywhere. Sitting there high in the air, on a bed of giant sunflowers, our feet dangling over the edge. Holding hands. Multi-colored sparrows darting around. Stark white hummingbirds humming a concerto. A stream meandering nearby filled with pale blue swans. The air with the fragrance of a magnificent bakery. A rainbow formed a canopy just above. Time suspended. You and I forever.

LOVE KNOWS Never hold back. Do not restrain. Love is a master that requires full obedience. Forget doubt, do not question. The heart knows its own direction. Its intent is pure. To give unfathomable happiness. To give pleasure and create bonds of everlasting joy. To please, to surprise, to give hope. And when brief parting darkens the sky, know that reuniting is like a thousand sunrises.

A PURE WHITE LIGHT I stand at the edge, waiting. Waiting for the dayâ€™s first moments. A sweet, fresh mist comes rolling in, encasing me at the shore. With the first light I begin my run and soon feel the long moist grass try to wrap around my legs. I continue to savor the cool salty air, and watch the nearby terns dance to escape the incoming waves. Deep, steady breaths create a relaxing rhythm, my mantra. In this state my thoughts drift to you, surely asleep, still waiting there for me, radiating that pure white light there on your cloud of sheets and pillows, while the last of the moonlight mixes with the first of dawn enhancing your glow. I quicken my pace realizing that the sooner I finish the sooner I can slip under the covers to enjoy your warmth and the rest of that morning.

IN THE HEART Love. It is assembled in the heart. Gradually pieced together, little by little. At first it hardly has any substance, perhaps just vapors really, like slices of wind being glued together by imagination. Until it begins to take some form, accumulates substance, becomes tactile, recognized for what it is now becoming. And then, if lucky, finds true reciprocity, bonds with its twin, blossoms, flowers, receives its needed nourishment, becomes fragrant, produces nectar, joy, happiness.

REMEMBER ME AND SMILE My Love, promise me. Do not weep when you hear my voice whispering words of love in your dreams. Do not weep when remembering the wonder of who, together, we were. Know that, although I’m gone, you will readily find my heart in your memories, residing in these poems, and ever so tenderly in your dreams. Know that during our times I was always busy gathering up bits of you that I found in the beauty of every sunrise and sunset, in the sweet fragrance of mornings’ flowers, in the joy and laughter of our children and grandchildren, in all the world’s wonders, and then kept them bound up with you so tightly in my heart. So, do not weep, but always remember me and smile.

WHEN My Love, when we are apart and you feel the wind blow across your face think of my lips gliding along your neck, your cheek, your lips, and lingering there. When you feel the warmth of the sun on your legs imagine the heat of my hands caressing them gently, then higher and still higher. And, just before you drift off into the night, stretch out your arm and take my hand and I will follow you into a night of our dreams.

AROUSAL Sheâ€™s asleep. Nested in bright white silken sheets that cling so perfectly to her now warm, sensual, form. Arms and shoulders bare, skin luminous. Hair framing her exquisite, delicate, most tender beauty. Those sweet, moist, irresistible lips, my desire to kiss them and caress her an imperative. My book of love poems open beside her. Which ones did she read tonight? Is she dreaming of me, us, now? I carefully slip under the covers and draw close, inhaling her fragrance. A gentle kiss from my heart as she moves into my arms, smiles, slowly awakes, and draws me to where she wants me to be. Oh, my!

INEVITABLE I can’t quell the depth of my disappointment, the anger. But, I don’t know to whom, or to what, to direct it. I still can’t grasp that it will be, has to be, that I am powerless to alter the finality. Of course, I understand the facts, the absoluteness, the indisputable reality. Acceptance of, expecting, yielding to the inevitable, is what’s sensible. But, how could it really be, that I will cease to exist and not be with you forever?

LAST MOMENTS I’d prefer it to be when I’m holding you close in the night, feeling your tender warmth, sharing times’ memories, whispering words of love. Or maybe when we’re sitting outside holding hands, feeling the cool air of that night’s approach, watching together the glories that dusk brings. Whenever, wherever, are our very last moments together they can only be an inadequate coda for a spectacular, grand, and wondrous symphonic life lived together.

RENEE

ARTHUR

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