Poem To The World

When lovers
on the brink
of
finding out
Recline on
fat illusions
of
their words
And utter platitudes
—instead of shouts
Forget
tender silences
they’ve shared
And all confession’s
awkwardness they’ve dared
Like
children peeking softly from their doubts,
There comes a time
of
darkness and despair
when moments seem
like hours under weights
Regret and fear
like
garbage fills the air
And lips of fondest memories
turn to hate.

When lovers
on the brink
of
coming near
forget
the
body’s swelled
and
aching cries
And
substitute excuses for their tears,
Something soft
and silent in them dies.
And
that, perhaps, is why there are old men
On benches
all alone
in city parks
And
bony-fingered spinsters with hard sad eyes
Knitting things for babies in the dark
And maybe why we’re lonely
in
the spring

When
all the earth her fat thighs opens wide
To show us all her pretty under-things
And
laughingly invites us to her side
To
kiss away the differences we’ve known
With the
tenderness
and
wisdom of her groans
Yet
We
lie beside each other
in despair
While
our bodies
make love
—in
the air.

- Bill Duke