:Poem
And so this poem, the lover
gone quiet, the last good friend,
abandons you--

                   you
who expected so much--eloquence,
the unscabbed truth--

You, whom I loved
beyond saying.

This poem will never grieve you--
though you turn to the mists,
to the starved arms of the larch,
to the dumb hills themselves...

It hurts me to see you--

Warmth, you told me once,
is more important than truth.
For truth, if it is anything,
is cold like the moon.

But this poem is no moon.
It is only a lie.
Though I brood through the night,

it will not see you through.