Episodic Sterility

After she left, her hair Lay glowing dully, in the shower, Black, glittering with unshed venom Perhaps scheming to paper-cut my hands As I cleaned up afterward Or maybe it wanted to tie itself in knots About my throat as I slept And even if there had been enough of it To do the job, It could not marshal its forces together enough. On her head it was like a golden altar’d god Commanding fear or respect But once fallen, I could grind my heel into it Crush it into the ground As if another dead stinking animal. But far away, she glittered and schemed, So far away, vanished like an eclipse That no astronomer ever noted, Or disappeared from the chart; The corpse of a cold breeze That never lent warmth To any living being.