“Il faut, voyez-vous, nous pardonner les choses”
~ Paul Verlaine in Romances Sans Paroles
[ “I need you to pardon some things.”]
“Let’s be two children,” Paul suggests, leave
The cabbage life behind, and live on love
Outside the world’s stubborn facts. Let’s cleave
Together, putting poetry above
Banality. What’s passable is swamped
Terrain. Our food will be the shape of moons,
Not dried up bread for us, but croissants chomped
With sex. We’ll straddle mountains, not sing dunes.
Let’s trifle with profundities and plumb
The depths of verse. And when we find that souls
Can’t mingle, but are separate rings, our dumb
Discovery will shout, “There are no wholes!”
..We’ll live united on a flaming yacht.
….“At least we’ll grieve together, will we not?”