She wades in it.
Sometimes she slowly
descends, like sweat
down her brow;
like lips to a frown
but she battles it.

She bathes in it-
a smile as she practices
a pleasant look in the mirror;
widens her eyes, breathes
softly in then out,
in then out
though he no longer breathes.

In the dark of her heart
she screams, claws, begs
for him but only she
can feel the
beat   beat   beat
inside her bones.

She clings to it,
cradles it like a sleeping
child that will soon
wake, and wail
and wail...

It was the night your hands lingered in the pockets of your coat.
You didn’t reach out and touch me,
didn’t offer a hand to say hello.
You sipped from the flask in your pocket,
told me how you really enjoyed the book,
and that Kafka was one of the great
theologians of our time.

You pointed out constellations I couldn’t see,
and talked about Dante like you’d
been having lunch.
You impressed me with your knowledge of
what makes a grilled cheese good,
and remembered that it was my favorite food.

We drank dark beers, I let you tell me a story
I had already heard.
I laughed at it again, like it was new.

Your cigarette hung from your mouth so effortlessly,
I wanted to pluck it from between your lips,
light it, and take a long drag.

I wanted to lean out into the universe around us,
interrupt space and take those
cigarette lips into mine.

I watched your hands ring around themselves,
knuckles swollen and tight.
A scar puckering the skin above your thumb--

We walked by the river,
I asked if you like to swim.
You laughed.

Did you think I meant to do it now?
Peel off my clothes one by one,
hoist myself up on the ledge,
creamy, unpuckered white skin glowing
under the pale moon.

I would have done it.
I would have dived.

Taken one small leap and
sunk my lonely body in that mud;
gritty and ,
the clay
of the Earth clouding the water,
soot settled down around me.

I would have done it,
I would have jumped if you only
told me you liked to swim.

Up to our feet and let's leave the world:

My darling there are too many too much
And too few; my sweet, feet down
On the ground and let's go.

Into a cabin a fortress, into the whiling
Of quiet hours and smiling at
Birdsinging noise from the sun world
Through the window — into us, my love.

Into us and we and none else
(For a dreamtime if not forever)
Dipping our feet into no need no care;
And only no one shall find us there
When we retreat, the world out of our hair.
And we shall come back to dark outside
Sunshining and birdsinging.

We bracing us until rainclouds shout
"Downpour, deluge!" into our ears;
Then up to our feet, my darling my sweet,
And again into leaving.

In my childhood rumors ran
   Of a world beyond our door—
Terrors to the life of man
   That the highroad held in store.

Of mermaids' doleful game
   In deep water I heard tell,
Of lofty dragons belching flame,
   Of the hornèd fiend of Hell.

Tales like these were too absurd
   For my laughter-loving ear:
Soon I mocked at all I heard,
   Though with cause indeed for fear.

Now I know the mermaid kin
   I find them bound by natural laws:
They have neither tail nor fin,
   But are deadlier for that cause.

Dragons have no darting tongues,
   Teeth saw-edged, nor rattling scales;
No fire issues from their lungs,
   No black poison from their tails:

For they are creatures of dark air,
   Unsubstantial tossing forms,
Thunderclaps of man's despair
   In mid-whirl of mental storms.

And there's a true and only fiend
   Worse than prophets prophesy,
Whose full powers to hurt are screened
   Lest the race of man should die.

Ever in vain will courage plot
   The dragon's death, in coat of proof;
Or love abjure the mermaid grot;
   Or faith denounce the cloven hoof.

Mermaids will not be denied
   The last bubbles of our shame,
The Dragon flaunts an unpierced hide,
   The true fiend governs in God's name.