The etymology of first love

You too believed in the heavens’ embroidered cloths
and that a bouquet of dandelions stains just your hands,
even if it’s already past midnight and your posh vocabulary
feels like a string quartet playing to the chomping down on a steak,
and the rough fabric is chafing your neck in order for you to amount
to more than the omission apostrophe in a shy ‘scuse me, please,
you will remember for the next four decades as the redhead with freckles
you’ve never had the chance to meet; just saw her once from a distance,
still too young to matter—a half-crown and a day off worth a stanza
or at least an enjambment.


More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com

Dreamers

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
He wishes for the Cloths of Heaven, W.B. Yeats

Would unfinished business be better
than no business at all?
I’d say that’s a question whose answer might lie
somewhere in one of Landor’s six volumes
of ‘Imaginary Conversations’
or in a chance exchange in the lobby.
But if you appreciate—
that’s the crucial part—
a glass of water and a self-portrait
by Giuseppe Arcimboldo
and aren’t embarrassed to shed a tear
while watching a film about books
with the future Dr Lecter reading Yeats,
you might already share
the sentiment.


More words to ponder at maciejmodzelewski.com