The Lucifer Cantos 1/13

I

A tick of clock, a click, a drop of pin.
The subtle hiss of gramophone begins.
The green glass lamp flicks on. Doors softly shut.
Death shuffles cards and nods for me to cut.

Jade eyes and autumn hair, a boy, he seems
to smile a truth of ivory and cream,
a grin of sin; his skeletal ideals
charm out the devil in my heart. He deals.

Hands off and on the clock talk turns of time,
deeds of the dead and damned, the deep sublime
myths of our memories, the morrow's news,
sorrows of Lady Day's recorded blues.

*

Out in the street a triple of triplets skip
in time, a playground rhyme upon their lips.
The mouse, the apple and the sun they sing.
Dance through delirium, Pierian ring,

spin as the seasons and the stars, clockwise
and withershins; sing roses, posies, sighs,
the prick of thorns and lies, the mocking birds;
I'll deal with Death, the world of gods and words.

The evening shades now. Let us speak of soul
as ochre athlete limned on antique bowl,
cadmium red on black, that hot July
we met, Death and the devil, you and I.