Love Laughs Last
time was/is
a company of suns is down in flight
and will not burn the brilliant rains again
nor rise to saturate with days the bright
and absent lands where we have been
those suns gone down no longer heat
as when
they crossed and left their trails of feeding light
and now we cannot touch that altered then
nor bow to set the ancient motions right
my love alive we find ourselves near
night
and mourn the suns which tumbled to their end
in that far sea where still our dreams descend
and shall until a darkness stops our night
still let's conceive that somewhere
set away
those suns that elsewhen burnt burn yet today
Jan, Mar 1979; Oct 1980
Last Divide
If ever I banked on ending at our skins
I know now I was wrong.
You or I will tell some disposer of remains
to burn the other down
but what he burns will not be one of us.
I've been practicing at pulling us apart
in case what's left is me.
As lovely as our coupled bodies are
what really marries us
is power joining parts no one can see.
Feb 1981
To you I say
In none of our bright cities do we stay
when we are dead
nor shall we cherish views
when sky blue grass green earth
brown
matters weigh
if you and I are not still I and you.
The pieces wholes and parts of parts decay
and if there be an everlasting glue
which holds the world
then though it sty
does glue love strive sing
wait for wonders too?
I madly dream that we shall find a way
when we are dead
to meet and set out new
or barring that
I plot that worlds replay
and we may join again what we now do.
But if we die for good
why then
goodbye.
We had the world we loved in,
you and I.
Nov 1980, Aug 1981
To Dawn
Warrior, we constituted battles.
You honed yourself on my blade, I on yours.
With mounting joy, we wrestled in the flesh.
Out souls were hurt but healed like woven snakes.
Builder, we manufactured people,
made them peaks and fabricated valleys.
And coveting Pythagorean shpheres
we turned the whirling world into our minds.
Voyager, we're taking on some water,
two creaking convoys in a common sea.
Whatever we are guarding will remain
as long as we are close enough to shout.
Dec 1978
Consolation
And well, you know, some day the sun will die
and spoil the neighborhood, and all bright games
will slough at night, and all of Plato's names
take flight. No problem, heavens, you and I
will be persuaded to transmogrify
and settle down to toast uncircled flames
before the great palatinate proclaims
the world to condescend to, bye and bye.
Well then, no matter, do the tricks you try
to play on me, upend my drawing near
to you and (sigh) no matter how you cry
to me about the pinions of the year
I know that I can still identify
with burning toasts and stars the disappear.
Oct 1984
Excelsior
The hill sings grass but you hold back,
afraid to test the path which seems
to drop to nowhere, while I
push on to someone's old
remains,
small stones arranged like messages,
amid ashes, beer cans, condoms,
left in this slight declivity,
shelter on the summit,
with room
enough for fire.
Come love, we'll overcome the trash
and lie as if we were alone,
together,
higher than the world,
but low
enough to keep us warm.
Jul, Aug 1981
when we were young
remember love when we were young and where
insistent to each other we would be
incorporate in gritty ecstasy
in fields of moon and we were lovelike there
and inside when we lay we could outwear
the night and listen to the strategy
of banging freight cars being joined while we
set voyages of which we weren't aware
no greater mystery excepting death
will penetrate our days and make fulfill
the monuments of flesh in which we care
until the day we break our beating breath
and time must discontain us waiting still
remember love when we were young and where
Jan 1979
May
The waves from the open window
wrest gently here
as I nest along you.
The traffic sounds are locusts,
the fumes of spring
stronger than exhaust.
Today I do not feel
I must apologize to you
for the world.
May 1984