The poet experimented with rearranging couplets in this 1979 piece.
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the reds and golds had melted down to flow across the grays...
you asked me for an answer to the riddle I’d once told.
the blues and fecund violets were counting all the days...
the puzzle pondered Plato, though he knew the trail was cold.
the cigarette was bitter, but the taste was all the same.
I asked a dark reflection if he knew me by my name.
the glass I drained, it lay there...just feeding on the dregs.
the goblet’s handle felt to be the image of your legs.
a thousand shades of ebony descended with a laugh...
the bloodstains on my forehead now asked for a cup of tea.
the silvers and the cobalts now killed the sacred calf.
the auctioneer recanted and my soul was sold for free.
every woman dressed in red had slept with me before.
and every woman dressed in black lay dying on the floor.
the reptile lady danced for you...she climaxed with a yawn.
we drank the lies and told the wine until the early dawn.
William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.