It is but the work of a moment.
A brief, unnecessary apology was
All it took to capture me.

The part of my heart that clings,
White knuckled, to the idea of romance
Is still vulnerable to the simple things.
A fault runs through
My metamorphic marble soul.

Somehow, I did not notice it was gone
Until suddenly, startlingly,
It returned: the muse I found in
The world, and in those hapless humans
Who touch my life with
Just the right degree of gentleness
And beauty.

That urge to make it last,
To pull apart a perfect moment
As I try to prolong it, is still there.
It feels almost primal: a defence
Against the dark art of memory,
Against allowing perfection
To pollute my life.

So I deconstruct these gifts
To try to find out how
They were made, only to discover
I cannot put them back together.

From what is left, all I can make
Are words, at once barbed and
Meaningless, the map rather than
The territory, a clock face
Rather than time.

02/19/2016

Posted on 03/21/2016
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