Muse

Cherry-hard young I was

when first you bedded me

and did the things lust does.

Though you lived fast and free

I was not one who sought

new faces or new ends,

hungry for what you taught:

the tyranny, the amends.

Of late, you're back again

(no new lads to uncover?)

demanding I maintain

some semblance of the lover;

listen, I held your heat

risking all to defend it!

Old now, I cannot cheat

the silence that must end it.

So let it end in sleep,

the spectral with the human;

what goddess cares to keep

at love's expense love's union?

You'd think I might have learned,

having done Hell and burned.

Moore Moran

From Firebreaks, Salmon Run Press,
© 1999.  Reprinted by permission of
the author.