The rainy Pleiads wester,
Orion plunges prone,
The stroke of midnight ceases
And I lie down alone.

The rainy Pleiads wester,
And seek beyond the sea
The head that I shall dream of
That will not dream of me.

slowed to a halt:
a winter afternoon
or the sun’s departure in
the northern woods—
this is I,
and you as well with your heavy
eyelids and heavy hands.

we still are not light;
not the lithe feet of a
whimsical dance.

we are not the yellow light
in slits across the
wooden floor.

we are hot air
running thick in
the mouths of all who
dare stand in the heat

—yes!

for the sun has drained us of our green
but left us gold.

for this, we are enduring.
for this, we have tried
not to stab ourselves
with our own sharp spines;
the golden sword of
of thoughts.

The cause of ignition is inconsequential,
no trigger to let loose the hammer- Only,
I become a passenger, a **** cur.
Softly as a dancer, on swells of change,
undulating to the jangle and clink
of lives being unlaced,
splayed apart  in bitter irony,
displaced into objectivity.
You take it personal,
as if, I am just a faltering piece of personality.
Dropped like salt in the Devils eye,
I'm just over shoulder- needing the fall
into comforting familiarity.
I'm unfeeling, mute and defensive-
peeling self back to where we merge.
At the base I know I am one
but cruelty makes our hands feel like four.
I am my own dark passenger depersonalized,
sloughed off in stress and
bound in unrecognizable life.

The bird that feeds from off my palm
Is sleek, affectionate, and calm,
But double, to me, is worth the thrush
A-flickering in the elder-bush.

In youth, it was a way I had
   To do my best to please,
And change, with every passing lad,
   To suit his theories.

But now I know the things I know,
   And do the things I do;
And if you do not like me so,
   To hell, my love, with you!

Joy stayed with me a night--
Young and free and fair--
And in the morning light
He left me there.

Then Sorrow came to stay,
And lay upon my breast
He walked with me in the day.
And knew me best.

I'll never be a bride,
Nor yet celibate,
So I'm living now with Pride--
A cold bedmate.

He must not hear nor see,
Nor could he forgive
That Sorrow still visits me
Each day I live.