Absence

No more songs escape

my skin. And I

wonder why that is,

It’s you, I’m sure. 

Whether by burned hellfire

through the

libraries I collected;

or my willing atrophy as, on a fainting

couch, I stare through fogged glass

over bright green

hills, daffodils wetted 

in the forever rain you gifted,

straining;

or a secret pact between

us two

to place a lock each

on the doors—

one silver, one gold, and one

more neither can undo—

with whispered shortcomings

and unread notes

slipped tenderly through the 

cracks; but where

was the promise

made

to keep the unrequitted 

pristine?

a lilt,

(my love keeps

its promises) my

lyric

refuses falsity and

sleeps.