All silently the space of love transformed,
Congealed into a frame one could not enter.
Even masked, we were stopped by all the norms,
And our days were locked in sunless winter.

Time then assumed a terrifying weight —
The weight that love keeps blessedly at bay —
As each embrace carried too much freight,
Each word burdened by too much to say.

Death was in the air. Frozen in defense,
We’d lost the largesse that graces human life —
That lets us credit the foolish sense

That what we love is ours forever, rife
With delight in a lavish present tense
That fears no end, foresees no coming strife.

Stolen moments became more precious yet:
Each might have been the last — a threat we don’t forget.