October 2022

 by Jack D. Harvey

Fool, she said, groping

in my breeches with

sagacious dexterity,

Fabius was mighty

but he went backwards too,

and left a stylish legend

twinkling down the years.

She started her handspiel,

but how gladly I left

Paradise and recoiled

from her amorous grasp.

The work, under her labor

had grown, but disturbance

was dismissed and

sitting face to face,

like Sappho's sole

daughters our dactyls

touched and led the way

to quieter thoughts.

You're my girl, I said,

with molybdic seriousness,

as I looked at her

sour puss.

Auspicating in

my prophetic soul,

I thought, beaming at her,

if ever was a bed of steel,

here 'tis;

I'm trapped like a goat

on a precipice.

We looked at each other

deeply and harshly;

her wit was as much

as mine;

we saw though each other,

fallen from trust and truth

to cunning and deceit.

But, like a flash,

the mood,

tender and variable as a baby,

changes once again and,

gracious God, my pike

stirs, she sees, and,

ye heavenly host,

immodestly conquers.