First I went through a stage of bewilderment, quickly followed by frustration. Anger and bitterness came next, I think, with resentment weaving throughout the threads. And I mustn't forget the bouts of depression, nor the feelings of helplessness.

There were other stages, I'm sure, tied together by a hope that flamed just bright enough I couldn't stop trying, yet was never enough to cast the darker feelings into shadow. And after all those emotions had passed, I discovered there was yet one more.

Desperation…

Annette and I were separated so she could "find herself." It wouldn't take long, she said, though the days seemed interminable to me. A week passed. Then another.

Fifteen days after she moved in with her brother's family, leaving me alone, she phoned to say she wanted to see other men. Nothing serious, she promised. But she could hardly "find herself" sitting home every night.
At the time, I believed any answer I gave would be the wrong one. And the wrong one, I knew, would destroy us. Twenty years later, I know the truth.

My answer didn't destroy our marriage. The question did.

She claimed she left because she was losing her sense of self. There was only me, and us, and never her. Or so she said. It wasn't until later I discovered there was also him.

I remember feeling betrayed. She was the one woman I thought would never hurt me that way. And those feeling of betrayal grew, feeding on my anger and bitterness, until they were only a single step away from hate. I never took that final step. But it was close.

I had been writing since childhood, but it wasn't until my second marriage that I started seeing my work published on a national level. An article here, another one there, never for very much money. But it helped instill some small confidence. I started to believe I actually had something to say, and maybe even the skill to say it.

A few years passed. Then my wife, the woman most responsible for helping me find the courage to submit my work, decided our marriage wasn't enough for her. She left me. For another.

And I discovered that all the words I thought I knew, and all the skills I thought I had, weren't enough.

I believe that suicide and depression, when not medically induced, are the direct result of not having a Dream to propell you into tomorrow. Take away a person's Dreams, and you take away their life.

And when Annette left my life, I realized yet another Truth about Dreams. The 'little' Dreams most of us are raised to pursue really don't mean that much.

I think relationships built solely or largely on physical pleasure are wrong. Not for any moralistic reason, but rather because it's too likely someone will get hurt. I'm sure I have a biased viewpoint (and will receive lots of email telling me so), but I believe men and women have different reactions to such seemingly casual affairs. Women can enjoy sex and companionship for their own sake. Men, sad to say, fall in love.

This poem is about one such relationship in my life.

My first two years of college were spent studying Commercial Art, so maybe it's not surprising my mind would turn to such a familiar subject when my heart was breaking.

A friend of mine is getting divorced after months of separation. He said even though he had moved most of things out of the house he shared with his wife, he never felt that the marriage was really over until he rented a U-haul to go back to his house and move himself out. As we talked, I could see that his emotions were converging...sadness.. relief...and even a little shock that the truth of what was happening was real. This poem is dedicated to him. May he heal.

Sometimes the description to a poem is more difficult to write than the actual poem. This poem was written after the death of an intense, passionate, romantic affair. The kind that you read about in books. Of course, like fiction, they cannot be sustained. Real life intrudes. And all we are left with are memories...a silk scarf and a red rose.

This poem describes a condition and feeling most know all too well.