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Thomas A. Thomas: While hearing the poet

reading love poems wherein he answers
questions asked by his wife about the length
and breadth and depth of his love for her
who could I think of but my own beloved.

There was that moment when distant blue
shone through centuries and more,
blue even older in your eyes blue reflected
millennia ago off the Euphrates the
Blue Nile the whole blue Pacific Ocean

when I knew I had loved you before there were
Octobers and Augusts, before monuments
made to the moon and the stars, which were
ours even before calendars were marked on
stones or bones those thousands of years love

before anyone had left Africa for Asia before
anyone knew the blue of the Aegean Sea
and its blueness and stars were etched
on stone and painted on walls. I loved you
sacred before temple, synagogue, or church

when love was blue water in a green cathedral
under a new blue sky and the water fell from
cliff stone into sun-sparkled air became the
dazzled light of water falling as I am still so
dazzled as earth draws me falling incandescent

for you now as through all those centuries
now as then as always I love you as the blue
water bends to touch the shore as we touched
our shores under moons and stars as we loved
again and again all this time since touch began.

~ after Aaron A. Abeyta

Sol Duc Falls (Photo: National Park Service)

~~~~~

Copyright 2025 Thomas A. Thomas. First published in MacQueen’s Quinterly.

Thomas A. Thomas is a poet, photographer, and editor who has lived gratefully in the Pacific Northwest since 1981. His latest book is My Heart Is Not Asleep (MoonPath Press, 2024).


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14 comments on “Thomas A. Thomas: While hearing the poet

  1. Barbara Huntington
    January 15, 2026
    Barbara Huntington's avatar

    Much needed. Thank you.

    Like

  2. donnahilbert
    January 15, 2026
    donnahilbert's avatar

    Spectacularly beautiful poem. And, yes, so needed. Thank you Thomas and thank you Michael.

    Liked by 1 person

  3. dion lissner oreilly
    January 15, 2026
    dion lissner oreilly's avatar

    I had to keep reading this lovely tribute. There’s a truth in it, and you can’t look away.

    Liked by 1 person

  4. happilyzany2fb88834aa
    January 15, 2026
    happilyzany2fb88834aa's avatar

    Hard not to be swept up in the grandeur of this. I just went with it. Charles ________________________________

    Liked by 2 people

  5. miketyoung
    January 15, 2026
    miketyoung's avatar

    What a spectacular love poem. The breathless enjambed lines work so well to fill the heart with the passion its expressing and building up, piling on time and history and expansiveness, reaching back to the seminal moment when touch begain. So beautiful.

    Liked by 2 people

  6. Vox Populi
    January 15, 2026
    Vox Populi's avatar

    Thanks, Sean!

    >

    Liked by 1 person

  7. Sean Sexton
    January 15, 2026
    Sean Sexton's avatar

    Indeed! Perfect timing for that transforming vision. I had to turn away from sadness, wrongdoing, victimhood. I need this poem as we need, and seem to be getting, rain.

    Liked by 5 people

  8. Christine Rhein
    January 15, 2026
    Christine Rhein's avatar

    What a beautiful love poem. The last stanza is stunning.

    Liked by 3 people

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This entry was posted on January 15, 2026 by in Environmentalism, Poetry, spirituality and tagged , , .

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