When it hurts so good…

 

Long as I live I’ll eat and drink

the sorrow of loving you

nor will I surrender it, this sorrow

to anyone when I am dead.

Tomorrow

when Resurrection comes

I’ll walk forth with this raging thirst

still in my head

-‘Ayn al Qozat Hamadani

from The Drunken Universe.  Omega Publications, 1999.

Few capture the strange sweet pain of frustrated love like James Carr and Etta James:

 

My own humble attempts:

Just look at what happened when they split the atom

You’ll see what you started when you broke my heart

There’s naught below the sun like broken love’s sad drum

We all cry when she strikes, and shake when we’re apart

Lightning hides up in the clouds, and oceans flee their shores

Mountains fade like shadows before hopeless lovers’ sight

If they could break this bond between my heart and yours

The world would vanish in a brilliant flash of silent light

 

My epitaph is on your teeth

Your rose lips are my funeral wreath

It’s beautiful to die beneath

The tender blossoms of your speech

Your hair, my prayer mat and my shroud

Envelop me in your dark cloud

I know now why the crickets sing

The music of the falling leaves

So let the sun abandon me

Your shadow’s all the light I need

 

It can’t be helped, hearts must be broken

So let yours be broken wide

Open as the ocean sky

From its ruins, love’s bird will fly

Don’t let your heart get broken in

By bad habits and sadness

But rise above them both and try

To Love, and Love without a why

 

Addendum: Dinah Washington and Al Green

If you’ve tasted what they’re talking about, then you know. If you don’t, then God help you…