Vespers

The towels rot and disgust me on this damp

peninsula where they invented mist

and drug abuse and taught the light to fade,

where my top-quality and rock-bottom heart

cried because I’ll never get to kiss

your famous knees again in a room made

vague by throwing a scarf over a lamp.

Things get pretty radical in the dark:

the sailboats on the inlet sail away;

the provinces of actuality

crawl on the sea; the dusk now tenderly

ministers to the fallen parking lots—

the sunset instananeous on the fenders,

memory and peace . . . the grip of chaos . . .