Saturday, March 01, 2008

What will survive of us?

I do not know if the echoes of Larkins Arundel Tomb are deliberate

SONNET

Time was when you & I would lie at night
As in our graves – a stone-faced, silent pair
Of effigies, the lady & her knight
Grown thin with all the years of shared care

I was entombed, a warrior no more,
Enchained by all the vows I once had made;
No more the lover or the troubadour,
I thirsted for the songs I once had played.

And so I left you, as in many a song,
And played the knight to many a damsel fair
And wooed them with my words, some false, some true –

Until the nights of love grew just as long
And just as cold, & just as short of air
And in my sleep I reached for you. For you.

Jonathan Steffen