SHE KEEPS SHEEP BY MOONLIGHT

{For Dianne}

Siberian squill flood up to the sill,
Feather-tipped, blue-veined bells.
The nectaries of Hellebores tonight are hid,
Downcast violet and olive peplum shells.

Sheathed in moon-stained yellow charmeuse,
Albatrossed with seeded strands of pearls,
She stands stock still, a prisoner of the window.
The single slip of periwinkle crepe~~
The Aerogramme~~troubles her hands.

She traces again the slight scratch,
The little stitches of black script,
The nimble loops so quickly slipped
And pulled so unmistakably masculine,
As knotted swards of silk tie weeds
Clumped in drifts on a papery blue sea.

The sharp tang of iron and sulfur
Rises from the bath and stings her tongue.
From the crook of her small nib
She would billow out on vellum to him~~
Cattleya and pomegranate,
Jasmine and attar,
A seductive quelling finger to his lips,
A slurring opalescent lullaby.

In the morning she dreams
Under a hazy circle of midges and sedges.
The shrill tocks will come
And the sun will crash off bevels.
Will the honeysuckle still twist and rise
So sweetly? Will the warbler sing?
Or has all been lost, torn down &
drowned in the wreck of the night?



~~~~~~~