Behind the red rings

Without

Unmadeup, your eyes were sunken and tiny,

they faded into your pale skin and their orbits

seemingly decayed into shallow wells. Your

face lacked definition except where rings ran

red around your nostrils.

Unmadeup, your eyes were tiny, their orbits

decayed into shallow wells, scraped by awl

out of your faded skin. The hit of color

came in the red rings around your nose and

the

Unmadeup, your eyes were tiny pools, their

orbits decayed into shallow wells, scraped

by some forgotten agricultural machine from

the pale chaff of your complexion. Red

ringed your nostrils. A tissue, gloriously,

Byzantininely crumpled. A labyrinth from

which your drippings could not escape.

The couch was ivory white and inlaid with

a delicate pattern of slightly-less-ivory. You

slumped against the arm.

Unmadeup, your eyes were tiny pools, their

orbits decayed into shallow wells, scraped

by some forgotten agricultural machine from

the surrounding pale landscape. A tissue,

gloriously, Byzantinely crumpled in your

left hand. A labyrinth from which none of

your drippings could escape. I thought of

the last couch your slumped against, ivory

with inlaid pattern of slightly-less-ivory,

nine feet long and slightly curved, hugging

the crescent coffee table you bought at that

coffee-scented bazaar. I took you in my

arms then and laid down behind you, curving

myself around you as you managed to shake

less and less violently and then stop. I

don’t know if you slept, then. You were never

a reliable judge as to if you had or not but

the hour we spent enmeshed there seemed

both too long and far too short. When

--RFRY, 03 Aug 06

These are the attempts toward 12 Oct 1969.