If you love someone for decades, the spark becomes harder to find.

We love to celebrate the beginning, the intoxication.

And why not? It is one of the best feelings a person can have.

I should know. I have felt it many times. I have been drunk on the spark, blinded and robbed. And I would do it all over again.

I have cycled through love and pain.

I know the long-term demands that diminish the fire, sometimes eliminate the flame. The tears that accumulate quietly over the years. The pains that outweigh the gains.

The moment you see them age. The person you met long ago beginning to fade.

I look in the mirror and see my own aging face and I wonder if I still spark the flame.

I’ve lost count of the demands I’ve made. The tears I’ve caused. The pain I’ve contributed to.

But only those who run the course through light and darkness are rewarded with something rare, harder to name.

It is deeper than passion. Harder to leave.

Perhaps all along it is an eternal flame. Not the one that burns but the one that stays.

After decades of devotion and indifference, 

I am both a flame and an extinguisher.