What You Took

I always thought that when you fled,
You'd disappear with everything:
Our photographs, our books, your bed,
My wallet, the engagement ring.
Instead you left it all behind,
And more: your clothes, your diary,
Your diaphragm, an orange rind.
All waiting patiently for me.
You even left behind the chair
Your grampa left you when he died,
Its cushion stiff with ancient hair,
The one he'd used for suicide.
You only took two things I miss:
An unborn life; my hopefulness

I Knew at Last

I knew a man who hated love.
A timeless female ruse, he said.
Its bait is sex, its bed is glue.
It leaves you struggling, then dead.
A woman sighed, It's too much work.
I'd rather bicker with my cat.
I'm far too old to cry for two.
And as for spooning, far too fat.
Although I lived companionless,
My plaintive note was not like these,
My wail was far more eloquent,
Translated from the Portuguese.
I sang of love as sacrament,
Soul's highest goal and bravest pass,
The rarest gift from God to Man.
A gift too rare for me, alas.
My blood was frail, my spirit crushed,
My psyche rattled on a spit,
And though I dreaded loneliness,
I'd come to Earth to die of it.
But then, one night, I met your hand,
Engaged your laugh, adored your eyes,
And knew at last the way love moves:
Inexorably, beneath our lies.