(for Dickie, for whom I am most gratitudinous,
on this 35th anniversary)

Grateful are the rich in spirit,
we who remember that our cups overflow,
that our lungs breathe without instruction
or command, that our way has been paid,
our paths paved by some we know
and many we do not. The great miracle
is that we are not from nothing—
we are part of something and ever shall be.

We are held.

We say thank you in a thousand ways
—some of them audible—
your generous heart overflowing
into mine until blood and corpuscle meld,
the rhythmic ebb and flow, the synthesis
of give and take indistinguishable
from just a you or just a me.

We, grateful witnesses to this process
of living and breathing, loving and dying,
embody this fusion of humanity,
this circle of beloveds.

We abide in this amalgam of us.