You can have ties that bind
Or goodbyes all the time;
Robert Graves’ sand-drawn line.
In my mind
Her licked thumb perfecting my patina
Gina tying my tie before I went out with a Pope-due fuss
Someone mutters to instant hush
Candles on guttering-cusp widen like o’erfed childs
Sound-roused, back to the line
Having been gone a while
No word to break the withering fire
By an anaemic fire’s selfish half-heat
Perfecting lines about roustabouts
After a gassing, the blind, fumbling fingereyed lines return
Donkeys lion-led
Not a head held up in triumph, as if held by lead weights
One, wracked and wrecked, ruined by violence today
Extends a blackened hand toward my Woodbines.
Alchemisland 
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