Darkness Visible 2 (2000)

Darkness not that visible.
It wasn’t the fantasies
of getting drunk or bedding
strange women. Not the
actual tumble into ruin.
Not the reach or the fall,
but close. There is a darkness
next to dark shatter. The
murmur of shades on the rim,
their lacquered tongues
mournful and pure
like the last vespering bell
of the sea. I want to launch
boats all night on the waves
between as and is.
Glorying in the curves
whose rise cannot be seen
until they fall.