If You Only Knew Poem by Larry Lynn

If You Only Knew
what I do love of you,
would you then know?

Is it pure devotion
etched with words of LOVE
that follow deeds of selfless ardor
that binds my hands and heart to you?

Or lips that utter verseless words
of anguished passion touching mine
and places where no others do?

Or eyes that see me as no others want to see -
a statesman bold and chivalrous,
a verbose maven caught between
the ages then of what
young man could want
and now an age
when older ones outgrew?

Or ears that hear my garbled sounds
that rasp by night with ghastly noise
and are misread, misheard, or not,
by words you think I heard or said
with constant repetitious, "What? "

Or hands like anvils' jaws of yore
that reach for mine
in portside walks,
or hold my head
in hearthside talks,
and grasp in privacy my heart
and every other private part
that tingles with that vice-like grip
though gentle as the moistened lips
through which pass whispers
in the night,
"Good night, my love, -
to you, good night, "?

Or might it be that thund'ring heart
that beats for both of us - ?
for when I leave,
my chambers lie
on empty still
with hungered pangs
by you fulfilled.

Or can it be that selfless soul
that begs for me to find a way
to someone else who might one day
give more to me in health and youth, -
whose love so great would sacrifice
what pleases her to give her man
another love from one who can?

Or is it that
she in one breath
would stay with me
through life and death?

If you could only know

my life is taken in your hands
to do with as you please
as yours in mine
you gave too willingly—
that what I love of you
is clear to see:
it is the who you are
that is so dear to me.