She Said Yes

I did not know if the sky would crack
or cradle me.
My question hung—
a small bird of ash
in the throat of the wind.

I asked it with hands still warm
from the long silence of war.
I asked it with eyes that have seen
men die without names, many of
the nameless through my scope,
and fire eat the edges of dreams.
I asked with lips that had forgotten
the softness of “please.”

And she—
she said yes.

Yes—like water breaking
through the mouth of a stone.
Yes—like light entering a cathedral
long sealed in dust.
Yes—like wheat whispering
to the sun for the first time
after endless winter.

Not to love, perhaps, nor to the shape of it,
but yes to me, to we, to the open door—
a summer of forgetting the I and the you.
Yes to something not yet named,
but deeply, vividly, undeniably us.

I will drop my sniper rifle.
Its weight never felt holy—
only the cold certainty of purpose.
I will let it fall into the dust,
and with it, the ghosts it carried.
Not guilt, but gravity pulls me low,
as though each soul it stole
poured its sorrow into the steel.
Each round a toll paid in silence,
each trigger pulled a tether
binding me to a life not mine.
Now, only the ache remains—
the ache of unlearning
what it means to survive
when no one is left to aim at.

I will let it fall like a dead god
from my shoulder,
It has grown too heavy to lift,
each soul it stole adding stone to its frame.
Even the cruel ones—when struck,
became only men,
and with every shot a piece of me flew—
a soul-fragment spiraling, never to return.

Because she said yes.

Because her yes was a wing,
and my chest became sky.
Because her yes was a seed
and my soul turned to soil.
Because her yes was not
the end of a sentence—
but the beginning of breath.

But she—
her soul is too vast for one body alone.
And what I lost, she will lend,
spirit stitched to spirit, until I am whole again.

Because she said yes.

Because her yes was a gate flung open
in the mountain of silence.
Because her yes was a bell rung once
in a chapel where no one had prayed for years.
Because her yes was not possession,
but permission.
A map unrolled between two hearts,
with paths yet unwalked.

We will go,
she and I,
into our most precious mountains,
where I swore I could never go again—
Silna Polska’s pride, Her Świętokrzyskie.

Where I was scared too many ghosts waited.
But with her beside me, I see those fears undone,
where the giant oak leaves hum psalms in windlight;
they’ve seen several centuries of it, but do not speak of blood,
and the wind forgets its laments.

We will shed our names
and forget ourselves
like boots at the door.
We will become not “she” and “he,”
but the tender mingling of hearts called “us.”
We will share bread, words, laughter, stillness—
and sometimes, maybe, nothing, nothing, nothing at all.
We will forget the language of solitude,
for we will even shed our humanity,
and be but members of the multiplicity of the forest,
just two more animals,
living and laughing and loving
without the weight of names.

We will forget
how to walk alone.
We will kiss in the cave-moss light
On cheeks for sure, or lips we might
until even the birds learn
to sing our names together.

Because she said yes.

I who held death
like a beloved curse,
now hold her presence.

I who held death
like a rosary,
now hold her hand.

I who slept
with one eye open,
will watch her blink slowly at dusk,
and call that safety.

I who slept,
really, not at all,
will sleep against her shoulder,
and dream of nothing… except perhaps
secret even to me, the curve of her back
rising like a hill
I never dared climb
until now, but cuddling
simply for warmth,
no more than that,
whatever else my
thoughts beg of me…
or hers of her.

She said yes,
and I was unmade—
not into a soldier,
but a man who
again finally learned
what arms are for.

She said yes,
and it was not a vow—
but a moment of wild courage.
Not a kiss, but the hush before one.
Not a promise, but a possibility.

Let this war fall away,
like rusted mail in autumn.

Let this war vanish behind me
like smoke in cathedral light.

Let first the hills take us.
Let first the sun bless us.
Let the mountain rise.
Let the silence be shared.
Let me be remade
by something lighter than grief.
Let us be simply, wholly, quietly—
Us.

Let us forget everything—
Let us even forget ourselves,
Again I ask this of Thee,
O Creator, O Great Mystery;
let us forget everything at all
except how to love,
One cœur-de-nos-cœurs
without needing to return.

All because she said yes.