Along the lilac lake, the lingering evening

Relinquishing the slight, soft fragrance of dying

Strawberry leaves, I thought of you sadly again

And all at once I was speaking in the language

Of a vague emphatic past, familiar to me

Only in reproduction, a tongue of anther

And of winglet. This is the unself-consciousness 

Of pollen. This blue-black smear is the nightingale

The night breathes into its hands. These are the letters

Left in sand by a pair of snakes. This is the sea.

This is the sound of the strange scent of perfecting.

This is the moment in which they give you something

For the pain. And this is the moment in which you

Hold onto my hand and tell me it is hurting.