Your intangible way
of
flirting with danger

had captured my trembling heart as
a curious butterfly; the
sweet

ever
afterimage of
a still corpulent
man chasing the sable-tinged illusion

of eternity
with a young goddess, tracing
pirouettes through my vacant thoughts.

I stir, and watch as she steals
a blade of grass from my hand;
lingering for a moment,
dancing to and fro,
then dispersing in the summer air

while carrying the vestiges
of one more breathy and lachrymose hymn.