Night/Day

What happened to those nights of beauty and splendor
Moths beating out symphony’s against the light bulb with their wings
And you playing scratchy old Leonard Cohen records
Nights where sleep bayed like a wolf at the moon
And silence was the beating of your heart against my own
Nights where the pregnant moon stood vigil like a sentinel
And sleepy stars blinked and winked their way to earth
So close and vivid I could cup them like water in the palm of my hand
Nights I held you to me like a child at my breast
No one could touch or know us except ourselves
In that room
With its peeling paint and old armoire
Evenings sipped from gin bottles where the heat hung like a veil
And the only mystery
Was the love you guarded like Cerberus at the gate
The love you scattered on baron earth
With other women
In other hotels
With simple names and lives
Those goddesses of the shadows
Who loomed like giants in my imagination
Who beckoned to me like ghosts
In cigarette smoke and perfume.
What happened to those nights
And the warm shell of your arm
And the boat of your body
Which sailed me home
It seems a lifetime ago
The years swallowed the tears
Kindness learnt soon forgotten
Daylight
A torch on the wreckage.