After the incense, whisky , music, lamplight,
after we’d waited for the world to turn a quarter revolution,
when you had kissed the places that you found,
stopped short of loving
what was the unknown message that we’d yet to learn?
After you’d offered me a future apple tree’d in brilliance
some exotic paradise where life is clear blue lagoon,
when I’d checked my heart to find if it was beating
the way I knew you needed it to .
Outside the opaque window Venus rose between us
visible for an instant then lost in clouded conflict,
there was absolutely nothing left to do.
After touching hidden corners where the creases curled
after wanting some solution to the sadness that we felt
after tearing clotted arteries where the old blood lay;
when I tried to hear the question there was only empty footsteps
the shadow of oblivion where I could not stay.