I guess this is our final dance
Mary Jane.
I'm really leaving this time.
But I couldn't leave without
Breathing you in, just once more.


I want you to know I've cherished
The times. We've danced
The demonic and danced
The divine
And although there's been other women.
It was never as easy as
Loving you.


I remember our first time, Mary J.
It felt electric.
You tickled my senses, soothed
My soul, awakened my mind
And it felt, electric.


You opened my eyes,
And now I'm scared I can't see
Without you.
That I won't sleep without you.
And when I do,
That I'll dream about you.


But this is it, my love
Our final goodbye.
My mind is made up, I'm leaving tonight.
And when I've taken your last breath
You'll know that we danced to your death,
Mary Jane.

For years I've been your
Pretty, pretty china doll.
With pink lips, permanently set
Into a half-smile.
But inside, my china heart
Broke a long time ago
And the blood, it
Threatens to seep through
The cracks that you made.

I'm dreaming, dreaming.
And in my dream the
Mirror shatters.
Catapulting a million fragments
To the floor and little Lily
Is there. See?
She's playing with the shards,
Hands bleeding.
She pulls them to her mouth
Like her teething rattle.
Blood, dripping down her baby gro.
And you laugh, you laugh.

I watch your chest rise and fall
I can smell the whiskey on your breath.
I, I take a plump pillow and
I press it hard over your mouth.
The porcelain mask starts to
Slip, it slips. It falls to the ground
And splits, it splits.
You don't struggle and your chest,
It doesn't rise any more.

Now I rise.

I walk over to Lily's cot,
I check her hands and they're
Fine, they're fine.
I kiss her mouth and my
Tears drip, drip down her baby gro.

The agnostics have gone
Cuckoo.
They have carefully lost their minds!
The profound and the loyal:
God among men.
The citizens and patriots
Are fighting the Devil in Dixie.
And in this world of
Sustained images of hope,
The shamrock and the
Sun-kissed face.
Oh the Sun, that purifies all that it touches
Damns all that it doesn't.

I remember our garden,
Wild and beautiful.
Flowers snaked out over cracked paths,
Overgrown orchids and unruly dahlias
Crossed calla lilies,
As they protruded through the jungle
Of luscious foliage.


I remember the smell of jasmine.
It hung heavy in the thick summer air,
Heady and delicious. It was the sweetest
Intoxication and my Mother basked in it.


She would sit for hours under
The old mango tree, cigarette
Smoke coiling around her
As she watched the sun steadily
Disappear behind grey islands.


I longed to reach out to her.
To break her trance,
And infiltrate her thoughts.
I wanted to her to take me with her
Into those private moments.
I didn’t understand it then.


I remember the tune she would hum.
Those long, low notes, penetrating
From her soul.
As I put the silverware away, I hum it.
I hum it in memory of my indigo life,
Turned magnolia.


How I long for that mango tree now,
A hundred years old. His strong
Arms stretched around me,
And my own private moments.


Through the double-glazed windows,
I watch my husband gardening
And wonder. Should I bring him a glass of
Ice-cold lemonade, like
The wives on American TV?

Time
Is the coin of your life.
And did you spend it wisely my Dear?
Tick. Tick. Tick.
No Tock. Time
Doesn't live here any more:
No clock.
I couldn't stand his face and those
Hands, no longer gentle.
Time, time. Time is not the faithful lover,
He is the gypsy who packed up my salad days
And sailed down the Nile
Without a backward glance.
Backward glances. Recherche du temps perdu.
Time is the miser and he claims his fools.