Mystery eludes the firmament;
The unbeliever rejoices, yet certitude
Is but a pause, the prelude
To an inexplicable and joyous lament.

Trembling, your shadow drowns
In an explosion of desire,
A death whose funeral is fire,
And in whose gravestone life abounds.

I reach for you across the years,
Across the smoke and haze
That obscures your gaze
From a constellation of tears.

Somewhere there is a clock
That ticks in silence, that measures
Neither time, nor death, nor the pleasures
Of life, but is as though a dock

Unto a body of wonder and of hope:
Shall we board the ship
That follows your hips
To the end of a lover’s rope?

O, but where your breath rises
There I lie, a fallen oak
That doffs it cloak
Of beauty in disguise.

Naked, I am yours. Unafraid, unarmed,
I seek your arms beneath the sheets
That cover my heart’s uncertain beats
And become indifferent both to comfort and to harm.