This Is Why I Loved You

Your opal eyes
Your sea-blue eyes
Your sky-blue eyes
Your ice-blue eyes
Your gray-blue eyes, your periwinkles
Your hazel eyes
Your violet eyes
(almond-shaped and almost cubist)
Your indigo eyes
Your topaz eyes, your sunkissed lashes
Your turtle-sundae eyes.
I loved your black shiny hair
Your turquoise streaks
Your blond parade
(your hair that speaks)
Your red-sown hair
(cosseted in its own knot)
I loved my friends without sorting things first.
I loved your ringing in the ears
Your Rolling Rock
Your rough-hewn jaw
Your three-day beard
Your mercury
Your staggering toward me
in a werewolf dementia
in your navy mugger's cap
(I loved you and would have shown it to the moon)
I loved your nifty pronouncements
that drifted like seagulls over the pay lot.
And later, your country squire's avant garde
Your full-grown beard
Your handsome sons
Your spirited daughters
I loved you because you had good taste.
I loved you because I learned many things from you.
I loved you because you fed me.
I loved it that you read out loud to me.
I loved the personalities of your women.
We didn't lean.
I loved the country you were born in.
I loved its theater and rock n' roll.
I loved your classicism.
I loved earth more than I loved you, first;
I loved the animals, second;
I loved the children of other people in the wildest, most abstract way,
without irresponsibility or possessiveness.
I loved your passion
and your maroon eyes.