Thrall

Of course it won't last. You will break my heart

Or I yours, by dying. I could weep over that.

But now it seems forced, here in these heaven-hills,

The mourning doves mourning, the squirrels mating,

My old cat warm on my lap-here on our terrace

As from below comes a musical cursing

As you mend my favorite plate. Later of course

I could pick a fight. There is always material in that.

But we don't come from fighting people, those

Who scream out red-hot iambs in their hate.

No, love, the heavy poems will have to come

From temps perdu, fertile with pain, or perhaps

Detonated by terrors far beyond this place

Where the world rends itself, and its tainted waters

Rise in the east, to erode our safety here.

Much as I want to gather a lifetime thrift

And craft, my cunning skills tied in a knot for you,

There is only this useless happiness as gift.

THRALL

The room is sparsely furnished:

A chair, a table and a father.

He sits in the chair by the window.

There are books on the table.

The time is always just past lunch.

You tiptoe past as he eats his apple

And reads. He looks up, angry.

He has heard your asthmatic breathing.

He will read for years without looking up

Until your childhood is over:

Smells, untidiness and boring questions;

Blood, from the first skinned knees

To the first stained thighs;

The foolish tears of adolescent love.

One day he looks up, pleased

At the finished product.

Now he is ready to love you!

So he coaxes you in the voice reserved

For reading Keats. You agree to everything.

Drilled in silence and duty,

You will give him no cause for reproach.

He will boast of you to strangers.

When the afternoon is older

Shadows in a smaller room

Fall on the bed, the books, the father.

You read aloud to him

"La Belle Dame sans Merci."

You feed him his medicine.

You tell him you love him.

You wait for his eyes to close at last

So you may write this poem.