Recycled Lines

I tried composing lines for you
As a kind of loving token,
But I can't seem to get past phrases
That other mouths have spoken.

I know a world of poems,
I can sing a sea of songs
And there are parallels in each of them,
With feelings just as strong

But they belong to other people -
Those words have all been sold
And I wanted to find something for
Just you to hear and hold.

I could say how much you mean to me
Though it's all been said before,
Or liken you to the air I breathe,
Recycled lines and nothing more.

I could take every single sonnet
And every tragic play
And all the ballads ever writ
And have nothing more to say.

But every couplet ever rhymed
And every stroke of paint
Compared to how you are to me
Is shallow, weak and faint.

Even I cannot contain
The love I feel for you
So shapes and sounds don't stand a chance
However deep or true.

And so it seems that I have failed
To write what I had planned;
You won't find it on this page
But between each star and grain of sand.

Your love is such a part of me
That the feeling it enlists
I can't pin down on paper;
It roams in every atom that exists.

And still that verse a poor charade
Of some other artist's heart,
I find myself near destitute
Of a truth to set apart.

But there's no genius in time or space
Who ever made a treasure
More stunning than the spark that shines
Whenever we're together.