New Moon

You, love, you, all

countenanced in the white circumference,

and within

the earthshine

between the horns, the lemmas of Dis:

you, I love you still, you know. You,

who you said would remember, are forgetting:

I, whom you said would forget, remember. So it is,

So it goes on, like a net dragging the dewy hillside:

memory is neither clean nor dry. Only in poems

do you get to say “I told you so.”

Silk ears swivel and twitch,

muzzles lift, eyes widen,

lips lift and show the needle fangs.

Love is still alive and feral,

it still roams under the new moon,

trotting on ancient cinder paths:

and kindness, still there, whines

like a young dog longing for a walk.

I told you so. I know a bit about love:

I've served in this house a long time,

taking abuse and kindness as it comes.

The crescent silvers the scars,

The new blood holds the old blood in its arms,

and the thump of a dish on the kitchen floor

gets even an old dog to his feet.