Distance

Cimetière du Montparnasse

I speak for the distance between loves

Between currents of energy 

that long to be connected

To join together in a spark of ecstasy

This distance is cold and callous

Even if the entities at each end are not

It is relentless and heartless in its simple existence

As if to say, there's nothing I can do

Like a fly in a web, caught

It has compassion

For it knows its ambivalence is cruel

Yet it feels helpless to change

To rearrange itself

To feed the fire with an intimate fuel

Even distance longs for closeness in its underneathedness

for it is lonely too

This space between love

this villain of apartness

who longs to close the gap

(but it would be a trap)

To get close, and lock oneself in love

Distance is clever

It knows that to feel love's breath and truth

There must be space, however languishing

To grow, to yearn, to breathe

For within its breadth

Lies the longing

Which keeps love alive

And living underneath

The distance

Words by Tracey Lynn Ellis