Listing to Port in a Storm

Give to thee a wish-lashing kiss,

And forge weather to split the age

That whispers sweet, invoking rage,

To quarrel in chaos this.

To summit mountain’s holy light,

In blind, feign ignorance to all right

And wrong which to me in turn might,

Ask’d calmly, with bloodied fist,

Be solid, stable, but heaving waters kiss.

Decry my starry eyes, my tremulous kiss,

That brushes goose hairs on your lips

And to the skin sticks, tears, rips,

And never again to portside list.

Lambast my heart, my words, my pen

To cradle quill as close as friend,

And mutter beginnings without an end,

That touch of paper, lover’s kiss.

Suffer not that the lack of kiss

Of Muse’s playing does defer,

And into quiet muttering, infer

The truth behind my chthonic dis

To which roams a lost and broken man

Who deals and plays as well he can,

whose cries befoul the slumbering land.

He is not white, nor black, nor this

Or that to offer one last sopping kiss.

I fain to think that winter’s kiss

Which calms and cools this blood of mine,

To wit and wonder of what is thine,

And what is ours, if given this.

I ask not forgiveness, not faith nor foul

Of what is good, in cassock and cowl,

That breaches silent, ghostly owl,

In giving you my love, my bliss,

To kneel, receive your reverent kiss.

Ask not me to use that kiss

Nor sword and shield to you defend,

But write for you a song to rend

Your heart to beats that breathing miss.

I beg you not to leave my side,

And to my strengths you must deride,

And remind me, like a child, chide,

That though my words are strong in bliss,

That I am yours, and to you I kiss.