O my sensual child of the newly waking hours
I can give you nothing but dreams spattered in mud
panting like blackened runners,
dreams full of speed and disaster.
I can love you only with kisses and garlands,
poppies wet with rain,
I can love you only with pebbles on the beach,
waters lost in thought,
strong as your stream of thighs parting round me.
The shadow of love's wet wing protects us in our undressing,
reflected endlessly in mirrors,
exchanging kisses as desolate as the rain unchained from black clouds.
Birds in the trees cry with distant nocturnal voices.
Through the reflections I hear you call me,
crying too with the distance of nostalgia.
Our dreams thirst like deserts,
need torrents to swamp the blackened hearts,
pouring over our dripping hair on this sultry, odorous earth.
You shimmer to the touch like a river at dawn,
lightening my soul with your lambence,
bearing roses and apple blossom to a dark room in need of May
hiding behind these rotting frames.