How soft your breath, how coarse my skin,
           how oft you rest like porcelain
as I, with tread so callous, head so proud,
intrude like ballast in threads of gown.
           How ineptly I love you,
           how delicately you love me.

It is easy to hold you, it is like breath,
          it is fraught then to lose you, it is like death,
I write what is simple, I write what is true,
and always I write, always for you.