The Wharves
Black lace against the ripples
of a crimson three-pile drapery,
curved bronze beneath the camisole--
half-dollar thick brown half-moon
(in eclipse) and her motto sings:
the overcrowded prison of her love
is only death.
(We walked for hours, spiralling
up the staircase of her inner workings:
she spoke of a blind sister, and how
her own eyes failed her.)
The ravished and the queen-- both hands
trace the allure of flaring hips;
jasmine billows from the brazier push
the swelling flavor of the quickened tease.
(Her book was gibberish,
but her torch was light
of living and the dead--
she would not remember.)
A turn; candleflicker lakes of murky shadow
splash across the creases of taut flesh--
before the unplugging of the night,
she sleeks across the room, denying.