One air-conditioned summer evening,
When the waking lamplights
Buzzed and sighed to life and
Yellowed the cooling stones
In the street beside our home,
You asked me a foolish question.
"Do we have a lasting relationship?"
No.
No, my love, we have nothing
Of the sort. No roses or chocolates
Or love-letters have ever outlasted
The final rasping, dusty cull that must
All mortal, fleeting things befall.
No whispered words, like golden
Birds on the morning wires can
Ever aspire to live beyond their
Breath. Each serenade fades with
Death. So shall our love,
When we go to worms, be gone.
But do not cry, my whispered love,
For though I cannot hold you past
The expiration of my arms,
You, too, will be the dullest dust:
Insensitive to my absent charms.