Parting

               Parting

Your hair disturbs my heart, distressing me

As much as ritual words a demon.  Light

Beatifies the strands and makes the sea

In sunshine vague banality.  The sight

Of sea waves seems mere repetitious fact.

Your hair recalls the hours of childhood play

When lemon-colored air was like a tract

Of heaven’s days made up of warmth and ray

As tangible as cooling gelatine,

As lemon-colored gelatine the air.

Your hair in light defies a poet’s line

To shimmer with a meaning which might share–

Deserve to share with you–beams

Of notice from the throne where God’s hair gleams.