It’s not fair. It’s not fair.
The one in love can only stare—
The glorious love unable to speak.
The lover, by loving, is always weak.
How can this be? Paradox of the mind!
I would share myself, be sensitive and kind,
But cannot. What is this paradox? I see, but am blind.
How can doing be not doing? When it’s in the mind.
The mind itself is a paradox, so everything there
Is a paradox. Love is always there.
And yet not. The fact about the mind
Is doing is not doing, and you find
This out because the mind has already done
What needs to be done. Here sits the sun,
Shining in a million different places,
As you kiss her. She has a million faces
Which you kiss, though her face is one.
She is only here—yet she is everywhere,
And more multiple and elusive, the more you dare,
Multiple and indifferent, the more you care.
The mind’s a universe! You know you care,
You want to kiss, but why don’t you dare?
You did it in your mind, and now under the sun
You have ideas for a million poems,
But you cannot write one.
You may decide to pierce the cloud,
The cloud of longing, the foam of song,
And what is wrong, when it’s already done?
Why can’t the knowing mind be strong?
Why is it seen as Hamlet-lonely, in song,
Who loved and kissed already, and is wrong?
It’s not fair. It’s not fair. Now, up in the air
Is my glory, my ecstasy. Up in the air
Is my release—but she isn’t there.
And now that I know what I will say in my mind,
What will you say? And will you be kind?