NOT QUIET ENOUGH.(Poem)

 
   Dread and sorrow reaching, in time, into 
   many reaches, there comes the hour 
   I wonder if my husband left me 
   because I was not quiet enough 
   in our bed. I can hardly see those nights 
   and afternoons, any more, those mornings, 
   but now, for a moment, I can almost hear 
   the sound of him then, as if startled, or nearly 
   caught up with, nearly in the grip of something like 
   terror, as if of death--and then 
   those honeysuckle moans, trellis 
   and lattice to mine, in the body's mouth- 
   to-mouth full-out duet. He lived 
   so deep in himself, he seemed not quite 
   alive like others, but hibernating, 
   I called for him through solid earth 
   until he woke, and left. Christ if my 
   love-cries woke him. Sometimes they were only 
   low, drenched, lock-clicks of the breath 
   stopped, then drifting in mortise-light 
   with him ... 11,000 ...