Embrace

I don't know what comes with age-
Wisdom
Or merely realization

Thinking back on love, I realize this...
It has only touched me once
Caressing me with its tenderness
Soothing me with its sincerity
Enveloping me with its honesty
Cradling my soul in ways uncounted

There have been friends and lovers
And lives drawn together to escape the loneliness
But of the seeds I have planted
Only one broke the surface
stretched its petals and bloomed

One perfect rose that I was allowed to hold
And though I still bleed from the thorns
I do not grieve
for grief would taint the memory
So I close my eyes again
Then smile in bittersweet remembrance
Of that last embrace