Drawing at the well (1998)

To draw your face with words
Needs something I don’t possess -
Through the imprint of you at the back of my eyes,
Through the memory of your caress.


For in song lies a blossom, a heartbeat,
A larynxlove pure, untouched, true;
Unsullied by promise of sweetmeats
From poppydreams scrawled in wild hue,



And how bright is the flame of the chorus
With fearless delight in its birth,
Untouched by life’s grimy thesaurus,
Unclipped by this rust-scissored earth.


So I’ll shape a phrase of you,
Inapt though my mothwords will be;
Through the essence of you in the mackintosh rain
Through the part of you dying in me.