Dusk Testimony
O not farewell, mistress of night and day
Do not be coy and go away
I love it at the sunset hour, I love you more
I languish in the evening's power
When dusk gathers her garment from the floor
And runs naked through the door
The room hangs with jasmine perfume, the power
Of my favorite night time flower
And memories from the edge of dawn's despair
Are gossamer in cupboards bare.
What should I have kept in this cupboard though
For all I have is pain here below
Jealousy like rats have gnawed board and bread
And many against me vermin bred
Resent that poisons have no room in my head
I can only think of God going to bed
Not bitter lies, nor spiteful things done and said
I have of scrawny minds so little dread.
Nor will I stoop to accomodate trifling characters
Trying to impress me as populist actors.
God loves men who abandoned him cross tettered
Nor ignorance that love has fettered
And I have loved the simple engarbed a subtle way
I have been the target of decay
And yet none have I denied the right to a better day
But could not succumb to the dismay
That cornered my innocense with empty display
Bleaching the night to look like day.
Rats and bats network the darkening day's edge, O
I can purge a space for hope, do not go!
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