Prophecy of Love

As he peered from his wake aloft the cliff that spanned the heavens,  out across the waning ocean, the shadow of a distant ship rose above the horizon.  The salty air was damp and carried the fresh sent of sea upon its shapeless breath.  Her hands broke the silence as she wrapped her arms around him from behind, and she asked, “Tell me, what of love?”
He turned and studied her eyes, nearly mesmerized by the blue that reflected the heavens.  Her hair shimmered as the sun on a dew swept morning; casting warmth with in his heart.  Her hands were as gentle as the breeze that kissed the sands on the shore far bellow.  Then finally he spoke.
    “Look around you…there lies the beauty of love.  There in the mountains stands its strength.  In     the trees , whispers its secrets.  In the sea, flows its hope…and in the skies, its song is sung so     all can hear its truth.  Now, look inside yourself, see its home.  There is where its life force     pours from your soul like a well-spring to replenish as you drink from it.  Only when you let it     live within you and become part of what you see around you; only then will it find you worthy.      Then love will beckon to you, you will feel its strength, you will know its secrets, find its hope     and hear its melodious song of truth.”
She turned in thought, gazing over the ocean and the peace returned to her.  The silhouette of the vessel now caught rays of light, making it possible to make out the tiny details.  Tears began to fill her eyes and as she turned to face him she asked, “Then what of these tears?”
A grim smile slowly made its self known on his face in an attempt to lighten the air that choked him, and he replied.
    “When the tears in your eyes refuse to fall, and your heart cries inside hidden from all, then it is     pride that suffers…But when they gather and give birth to a river that floods down your cheeks,     these are not tears of sorrow for what you have lost, they are for what you have known.”
With that said his eyes hazed over as moisture began to gather and he could feel the heart beat beneath his chest.  Then the silence stilled his breath.  The clouds began to roll into the sky, hindering its flawlessness with the darkened shadows of  the storms massive shape.  The thunder rolled and its voice shook the ground so as the tremble could be felt beneath their feet.  After a few moments she took a deep breath forcing the dryness of her throat to accept the moisture it longed for.  The she wiped the tears from her eyes only to leave a void of blue that slowly filled again with the salty droplets of silver.  With a breathless voice she asked, “Why then does the very thunder that sounds in the sky echo within my heart, sending tremors unto my soul and casting it in shadows as the clouds have done to the sun spilled prairies?”
With a sigh he murmured in a voice softer than the breeze.
    “Do you not hear the words I speak to you?”
    “Yes”, she whispered.
    “Then close your eyes.  Do not listen but instead, hear, feel, and find…Then you will know.”  He     paused to let her search, closing his own eyes.   “You see it…If so, then you have it…If you have I    t then you will learn…To learn is to then know.  You, You have the wisdom you seek,  feel its     words, its voice, its touch.”
He opened his eyes and turned his gaze back to the ocean where the tiny vessel was no longer tiny, for the markings weaved into its sails could clearly be seen now.  As the tears swelled inside his own heart, hope fled him.  She remained unaware of his sorrow, lost in her own journey deep within herself, to the center of her being, to embrace her soul.  There she knew lay the keys that would unlock the she needed so dearly to be open.  She needed desperately to understand, for even though her eyes were closed she could sense time was sailing quickly.
The muscles began to tremble in his whole body, and the fear danced in his stomach, unnerving him and pounding his hope into despair.  Slowly his thoughts began to betray him; telling him there would not be enough time and he would be lost.  Just then, as though the clouds lay witness to the ordeal below, filled with outrage, they burst open spilling countless drops of their invigorating moisture.  When the drops pelted his exposed flesh, his senses heightened and goose bumps sprang across him, wakening him from the trance his mind had pulled him so deep into.  His will forced silence to its deception and with the rain life breathed again into his hope, strengthening it to rise within him like a tide of its brother the ocean.  Frantically she searched for answers, for the door that has kept her prisoner for so long without tangible barriers, that stood before her now.  its ominous emptiness flooded  blackness  through her returning the unnerving feelings of uncounted memories that she cowered from.  
The Griffon seemed to roar in anger, but its eyes were filled with sadness.  He stood strengthened with pride and his feathers curled with freedom.  Yet this winged lion did not seem as though he were free.  There was something else, something unseen.  The silence below its massiveness.  Woven into the sails, the griffon, intimidated all who gazed at the vessel, but great loneliness-a windowless prison stained the ebony colored planks of the ship now anchored just off shore.  Time had run out, he must go.
Suddenly she heard the silent whispers of her hearts sooth her mind with her souls song.  She reached out to him, her sudden flood of feelings swelling inside her ached to spill out unto him with her new understanding, but he was not there.  Panic stricken, she ran to the ledge that plummeted into an icy darkness.  Faith returned to her as her thoughts vanished with the sight of his tiny figure making his way towards the ship.  She still had time.  Hastily, she made her way down the steep and jagged trail that strangely resembled the very journey within that she had just traveled.
The waves clawed at the beach, dragging port of it back into its self as they recoiled for another violent attack.  Each time the water crashed with anger, each tiny grain of sand it stripped away from the beach; so were the hopes ripped from his heart.  As his gaze fell slowly on the ship just off shore, his knees weakened, and tears sprang from his well-spring as fiercely as the rain that pelted his flesh from seemed to be the same dark storm that churned in his soul.
Just as the vessel tore through the ocean, so did the pain splinter into his very heart, continuing to pass through with the ease of the waves, dividing it-breaking it in two.  His gaze turned to the unseen  face of heaven, and he asked.
    “How is it that something can be filled with so much love, yet remain unworthy of its rewards?”
But from that silent place came no answer.  He dropped to his knees, for hurt weakened him so, and the tears were beyond his control.  His whole body wept, it could no longer contain such devastating power.  Several moments passed and he could feel the hate balling up inside him, combining with the darkness that sought to shelter his suffering.
When the foot prints in the sand no longer seem to fill back in and disappear, she knew he was still here.  She knew she would make it in time, but still she silently cursed herself for being so foolish and proud.  Her pace quickened as she ran down the wet, sandy shore.  A dense fog rolled in hampering her visibility, so she began to slow in fear of getting lost or even falling and getting hurt.  She then realized, these were the same fears she has carried in her heart for so long now.  The fears that cost her severely once, but it would not happen now.  The urgency to be hasty wailed up inside her again and she broke into a sprint.  An eternity passed and her lungs screamed in pain as sharply as the waves breaking on the rocks.  Then she knew she was close, for she heard him cry out in agony, and a sickness filled her.  She began walking, slowly, then she saw him.  Saw him looking to heaven from his knees where he collapsed and began to die.  Her breath hung in her chest and as she clasped her hand over her mouth, she felt the tremors of his pain.  The sickness in her grew and she could feel it contaminate her essence.  This feeling, however; reassured her and she shook free from her doubts, then approached him, he , unaware of her presence.  In a voice that sounded of an angel, she said to him.
    “YOU, you of all people… are not unworthy of love…You are not cursed to carry it and never reap in its splendid treasures.  You welcome love with accepting hands and you embrace it….for however many pains.”
He turned to face her.  She looked into his eyes and could see that he tried to hide his pain.  Sadness passed over her just as his gaze did.  With nothing left, she began speaking.
    “It is those who fear the thorns of love…those who seek it , yet when it calls to them they sabotage its plans and cast it away so they are untouched by love’s pains…They will not know the true sweetness of its fruits.  They are the ones who are unworthy of loves splendors….I am not worthy.”
His eyes flashed like the lightening that split the sky, and he shot his gaze upon her, but before he could speak, the tears that use to just gather in her eyes now flooded down her cheeks, reuniting with the salty waters of their father-the ocean.  She spoke again as his mouth closed.
    “I understand…” as if she knew what he was to say.
    “But if I am ever to be worthy…If I am ever to know, then I must do this.”  She paused for a second as she gathered her courage, her thoughts, and her feelings.
    “I need you…please…I do, I do love you.   I will not fight it any more, I can not fight it…I accept it wholly and I will bask in the penalties.”
He reached up and wiped a tear from her face and he looked at it upon his finger, he felt her love in that tear and knew she was telling him the truth.  She was real for once.  I smile spread across his face as he wiped a tear from his own eye.  He looked at it and then the one he took from her, finally he looked to her.
    “Love gives naught but its self and love takes naught but from its self.  If there is no love in return…it dies.  You are the reason I exist, without you…I’d die.  Now our story can begin.”
When she embraced him, she felt his soul touch hers.  She felt heaven’s smile and for once she knew that forever they would stand as two separate pillars of the same temple as one to support the roof that would shelter their love.