When Love is Not Love
Everything you do, you do in haste,
except when you make love to the one
whose mind, face, and heart at last
made you think twice and drop the phone.
A fool and his money get a slap on the wrist.
If the meaning of Capitalism is gin and vermouth.
the meaning of Bolshevism is vodka and lust.
On a tour of your assets from north to south,
I’d like to say that it starts with your mind,
but in truth the journey starts with your eyes
and their perfect view of the lay of our land.
Your lips come next, and how can I lose?
Easy. You lose what everyone else does.
Love is not love that alteration mends.
Our only future is the only all that is,
Our only hope, the tie that binds
us now. If the meaning of love is to sin
together, the meaning of lust is just a slap
on the butt. A fool and his honey are soon
departed, and their only future is to sleep
apart, two disembodied voices on a phone.
What did you lose today? Mind, face, money?
The one you love belongs to you, not someone
else, but you better act fast, as gloria mundi
is gone tomorrow, and life makes short work
of love. The angelic archer may shoot
his arrow, but his aim is just a shot in the dark,
and his target the foolish human, not some heartless bot.
[ipctured above: Bill Wadsworth]
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Author: The Best American Poetry
