I find myself in bed
with a woman who wants
to be a stranger to herself
laid out like a maiden corpse
resentful of those able to express
their thoughts, their eyes
her sight knotted to voyeurism
across-the-way apartment windows
the wife with her legs open
the husband of that house busy
with some monotonous chore
the humidity of the afternoon
sucking all will from her
wilted flowers on our balcony
her spirit wetted into the sheets,
I reach for her hand; it goes limp.
Her eyelids shut with sweat.
A light hangs over us.
in paradiso, ego sum