tears of joy

                                    ©Paul Goldman December 22, 2014

Tears of Joy


Once you have had your heart

cracked open to love, the dam has broken

and there is no turning back.


You are the causeway, the spillway,

the flood of emotion realized

in an instant-


all joy, grace, sorrow, compassion,

love, happiness, imaginable flows

through the empathic arteries


that have been forever altered.

You are literally a vessel

for humanity’s tears of joy-


awash in gratitude, you drop

to your knees to soak it all in,

as the sea of shed tears brings you


back to such a windfall of relief,

now that you feel, at last, what

it feels like to be in the moment- 


of emotion’s gift.