you beheaded and me beloved.

Let us lie there
 with these still words
   relaxed.

               With these more silent words

   I waited for you

with the smile not of a believer but something unmixed.

We strolled earlier amidst the shy recess

      of memory faded - a happier place

on the disks of light reflected

   imagined in turns fierce, proud, mutinous,

two loves not quite united

but at every turn no god - just the two of us.

Now in another time as we draw breath,

 a god commands

   we lie there

      close upon this earth

and in outstreched hand you thrust a knife.

 Who is he anyway that directs this stroke

   and calls it love?