The Gambler

Break me with your slow goodbye

Slay me with a look

Slake me with a lullaby

Replace what was took.

Promise me a day by day

Eternity and Love,

Then walk away as gently as you came

No push or shove.

Shed a tear in reading this

And call me now a liar…

By standing through the years

Emerging unburnt from the fire.

The betrayal of suggestion,

Do you feel the barb inside?

Regretting the concessions,

And the doubts you did confide?

What then, now, is this,

But my own holding of the fear…

If I do not pour it out

I am holding but a mirror.

A challenge or the truth

I speak either, you now choose

To shrink or honor vows

In the paying of our dues.