Hold still, I know it hurts
Much more than I can judge.
You live on the very edge,
Your guts exert a gravity
You begrudge.
Hold still, I know it hurts
When once again he skirts
The pith with verbiage.
He too lives on a ledge,
His arguments integuments,
Scaffolding where he can lodge.
Hold still, I know it hurts.
Precariousness imparts
Poignancy to rage.
We all must face the edge
When nakedness thwarts
And confines us in its cage.
Hold still, I know it hurts.
You live on the very edge.
Your room has walls of light.
***
This is one of several poems spun off the experience of living for the first time in a high-rise, this in the winter of 1969, freshly arrived on the Canadian prairies. I was a very difficult lover to have and so wreaked more damage than necessary upon those unfortunate enough to be attracted to me. I did have a sense of the suffering I inflicted, as can be read in these lines.