Flowers of Darkness

Slowly the night blooms, unfurling Flowers of darkness, covering The trellised sky, becoming A bouquet of blackness Unending Touched with sprigs Of pale and budding stars

Soft the night smell Among April trees Soft and richly rare Yet commonplace Perfume on a cosmic scale

I turn to you Mandy Lou I see the flowering night Cameo condensed Into the lone black rose Of your face

The young woman-smell Of your poppy body Rises to my brain as opium

Yet silently motionless I sit with twitching fingers Yea, even reverently Sit I With you and the blossoming night For what flower, plucked, Lingers long?