I used to watch the old boats on the river pass by  
Now with a haunting imperfect balance
Of light and dark
Black and white
Peace and war

Numbness

Nothing heightened
But Nothing blunted

It would tie your brain up in a knot,
the clink of glasses on the barman's grate,
and the tones of creaky Dublin croaking,
In darkness, mourning the death, of the daytime light.  

It would I say, to grasp the slender neck,
and to lift it, smiling, glancing beyond the glass,
at winking eyes and clinking pints of plain,
My brain is in a knot, when I think of you.  

I held you on the banks, of the  royal canal,
knew then what all the bards and lovers mean,
say it was the light reflected in their eye,
I never did hear tell, of eyes to rival glass

Yet confound revealing daytime light,
you are liquid of the night, stout and dark,
rebuke me not, till your own brain too,
Has been left in knots, by the dark slender boy.

And there you are again
With the same smile as months before
An undying crescent on your lips
But this time fractured by dark shadows and twisted words
A thorn on the stem of a rose I once held
preventing me from grabbing it with my outstretched arm
can you still feel the gutted petals?
I can.

And there you are again
Back in my line of vision
right at the corner of my wet eye
A weak ghost of what was such a strong memory
And Looking at you is still
like daggers.

Kindness glides about my house.
Dame Kindness, she is so nice!
The blue and red jewels of her rings smoke
In the windows, the mirrors
Are filling with smiles.

What is so real as the cry of a child?
A rabbit's cry may be wilder
But it has no soul.
Sugar can cure everything, so Kindness says.
Sugar is a necessary fluid,

Its crystals a little poultice.
O kindness, kindness
Sweetly picking up pieces!
My Japanese silks, desperate butterflies,
May be pinned any minute, anesthetized.

And here you come, with a cup of tea
Wreathed in steam.
The blood jet is poetry,
There is no stopping it.
You hand me two children, two roses.

Too many hours in the day
Are spent talking about last night
While I sit in silence  
Thinking about  
The day

And I stare at the photograph
With a bitter taste in my mouth*

*And dream of turning you into a pile of those same shredded memories