Still I dream if your sweet lips
Against
Mine.
Still I dream of us and wish I had
So much more
Time.
I adore you
I deteste you
I adore
I deteste
Until there's nothing left
(Of
me.)

It took looking at your pictures today
To remind me why I deteste your name
Taking them before I didn't know they'd linger with pain
Curse the digital world
Where I can't watch you turn to ash in a radiant flame

Je deteste pas le monde, ni les personnes
Quand je regarde la vie, je pense de Dieu
Il sait pourquoi, et je ne sais pas
Alors, mon debut est avec Il. Et ma fin est avec Il.
Et toujours, je tourne une nouvelle page

To feel your heart beat pumping fast,
And to hear your quick, sharp breathing,
all beacuse of me,
is something truly quite powerful.

To gently and softly kiss your neck,
and to bite down on your earlobe,
sets a passion free,
Which really is quite magical.

A French kiss, I usually deteste,
Something I find quite disgusting,
You've won me over,
Congratulations on your success.

A bed shared with barely any space,
Trying hard not to fall off the side,
Duvet disappeared,
on the floor, not needed any more.

Arms wrapped around one another,
Hand holding hand - entwined,
It felt like a dream,
to be with you that night,
A wonderful, glorious dream.

Why am I looking at this drawer
  and am afraid of its contents?
  over 60  love-letters of long ago
  which I could repeat almost by heart
  ( I kept every envelope as well-
    time, date received, year written thereon
   in my best hand
   as though they were worth more than diamonds)
  several containing crushed roses
  a few poems of Robert Browning
  Keats, Byron, sonnets of Shakespeare
  Yeats,  Donne, Thomas Hardy, John Clare..
  every letter a reminder
  of youth's once tender kisses
   solemn vows
  and secret words exchanged
  that could never be shared
  with anyone
  (love is too personal-
   a sacred pledge of hearts
   never to be broken)

    vanished are the dreams of youth
   I am old and weary now

    no longer the proud lover
    but a cynic
    no longer a believer
   in the glory of love-poems
  and stories of romance
  (yes---love is not a fairy-tale
   and all love stories should end
   with this sentence:
  ...and they lived with regret and sorrow thereafter...)

    words are just words
spoken at convenience
for the sake of the speaker
words are selfish
though the speaker knows not

she wrote and spoke more poignantly
than I ever could
she was mistress of words
she wrote as though
she was consumed by the fire of love
and would die in  its burning furnace
for my sake
all for my sake
' I would die for love
and for you, dearest
for you are my life
the very air I breathe...'

(I wept then as those words I read-
I memorised every word )

   Is love but sweet words
  to be forgotten ?
  
  I shouldn't open the drawer
  lest I begin to attribute blame
je deteste?  deja vu? chagrin d'mour?

I was about to stretch out
my hand ...
but my faithful wife called
from the kitchen
' why are you lingering in your study?
  darling, dinner is ready--your favourite chicken curry!'

You're no longer my secret
There's nothing else binding us two
I no longer belong to you

*Je vous deteste

Whispering in company
                       is bad manners, just as
yawning or sneezing, but
                   since the advent of Covid
19 this is no longer seen
                       as anti social behaviour
especially as people can
                   no longer pick their noses
in public due to it being
                 compulsory to wear masks
even if you are a Muslim
                 female in France where the
practice of their traditional
              and cultural Hijab was made
illegal by the Liberty Equality
               Fraternity resolution of 1789.

Ps.

Je deteste des Francaise.