This, my dear, was never meant to last.
[This what?] Why, us! This summer, too —
Lost, and lost again in losing you.
Likelihood too true.
And see this gold-trimmed sky?

Of course not. That western Eden, west LA
Knows not the fall. My fall. Golden,
Golden and rosy in goodbye. And I
Left to my sighs, have said farewell to you.

But here you tempt me! Tempted by
Your everlasting summer. Impossible
Improbable here, and happiness, oh!
Elusively falling by, curled and colored

Leaves of eastern coasts, unseen but felt.
Feel it keenly. In my smile as you say
Goodbye again. And for the last time,
Because you’ll turn to her. And I?

I’ll take the road less traveled by.
Alone, alone in difference.

For Sonya (and for Kim)

The days, and hours, each minute has its reckoning,
And what I did not know I did I feel acutely
Now. This knowing is the thing--unusual, and how
Cruel it is to see yourself so cruel. I did not mean
Yet neither was I innocent, but blind. And in this
Blindness truly viciousness was hid. But hid in
Me. And in me I must pay. For I no longer am
She who I was.
Wronged:
(I was!)
I have.

these faceless rainy days make ghosts of men
who dash along head down in wine dark streets
harsh footsteps muffled by the general damp
their figures dissipate. gray nothings. bleak.
stern buildings hunch together, cold and meek,
complicit in this stark humanity.
the misty sky with bold brush seeks to paint
all with a dull, cruel anonymity.
these phantom apparitions in the crowd
the distant nearness always out of reach
just touch, a simple touch is all i need
but we pass by ephemeral, each to each.
i linger longer caressed by this fall
the faintly falling rain that wets us all

[Another shot. And yes I should be doing my ELPC memo right now. But it's my birthday. I'm allowed a few moments of ridiculousness.]

Pensive Sara on The Eolian Harp:
My fanciful Sam! thy rough arm align'd
Thus with my cheek, most disconcerting 'tis
To sprawl beside our cot, our cot o'er grown
Through your neglecting Dreams, and poet's Scribblings,
(Meet emblems they of your forgetful Love!)
And watch the skies, that late were rich with clouds,
Grow raindrops round, and mark the chilling wind
Hungrily knawing (such should Knowledge be)
Our very bones! How piercing the scents
Snatch’d from yon compost ! and ourselves so hush’d !
The distant closeness of your absent touch
Tells me of silence.
And that simplest Lute
Wedg’d length-long in the clutching casement, hark !
How by the indifferent wind harass’d
Like some poor maid half-ravaged by a scoundrel,
It shrieks such heart broke sobbing, as must needs
Grant more pity to the wrong ! And now, its strings
Rougher struck, the long lamenting tones,
Over dolorous surges sink and rise
As new-made Slaves make, when they at eve
Voyage in iron chains to strange new lands,
Where Dignity in white cotton fields,
Footless and wild, like birds of Mockery,
Nor pause, nor perch, hovering on bruis’d wing!
O ! the separate Life within us and abroad
Which prevents recognition of kindred soul,
A light unseen, a blindness out of night,
False Truth in all thought, and hypocrisy there –
Methinks, it should have been impossible
Not to love all things in the world, but still
Where we walk unseen, at least as persons,
Is Justice slumbering on her instrument.

The market wins its pound of flesh,
Bailing out dead infants. And Rachel
Cries, and won't this debt of lives
Weigh heavily on us all?
Diethylene glycol would taste as sweet,
So let her weep. The market falls
Make haste! Deliberate will just
Debilitate. A sweet rememberence
plays upon my lips, a lot like love --
They stumble who run fast --
And land on us. Shadows on the wall.