Project for a Fainting

Oh yes, the rain is sorry, of course,
the rain is with her painted face still plain and
with such pixel you’d never see it in the pure freckling,
the lacquer of her.
The world is lighter with her recklessness,
a handkerchief so wet it is clear.

To you.
My withered place, this frumpy home
(nearer to the body than to evening)
miserable beloved.
I lie tender and devout with insomnia,
perfect on the center pillow past midnight,
sick with the thought of another year of waking,
solved and happy, it has never been this way!
Believe strangers who say the end is close for what could be closer?

You are my stranger and see how we have closed.
On both ends.

Night wets me all night, blind, carried.

And watermarks.
The plough of the rough on the slick, love, a tendency toward fever.
To break. To soil.

Would I dance with you? Both forever and rather die.

It would be like dying, yes.

Yes I would.

Brenda Shaughnessy