The Sun Lingers

The sun lingers over the ocean a little longer tonight,
While I remember everyone I love
And wish I could hold them in my arms all at once.

Words are so futile to speak of love, to heal hurts so pointless and unintended.

Perhaps life's greatest pain and longing is the loneliness of missing friends I cannot call to my side.

Curse time and distance and all the banalities of life that tear us apart.

I didn't know when I left home I would leave the brothers I loved.
Time was so omnipresent, we had every day, every meal, forever.

I wish as I watch the disappearing sun that I could gather together all those I love and all that love me,
And remain in one house, one town, one union.
No one left out, no one unavailable, no one whose voice and words and smile could not be at my beck and call.

I miss you all so much, And love you all so profoundly,
And refuse to understand a world and destiny that keeps us apart.

But I am grateful for the friends that life has permitted to remain,
Grateful for the memories, the reunions that lie ahead,
The laughs and tears and stories that cannot be told enough,

Grateful that the sun lingers over the ocean a little longer tonight.

James Kavanaugh from, Laughing Down Lonely Canyons