AFTERMATH

                                        

I want to talk about the aftermath of love,

    not the honeymoon or the hitherto;

    but the upshot and the convalescence,

    the slow, hard hauling --the heavy tow.

I want to tell you about those evenings,

     that crept inside like a vagrant cat;

     and cast around its drawn out shadow,

     untoward--- insufferably black.

I want to write about the mornings,

     the sterility of the stark, cold lights;

     struck against a pair of bare shoulders,

     the lurid whisper of a misspent night.

I want to convey the afternoon setting,

     the water torture of the sink;

     drip by drip, the clock and its ticking,

     and too much time left now to think.