I didn’t love you.
I didn’t see you.
I saw you for a moment,
a shadow.

There was that dinner party,
but I didn’t meet you.
God loves death
just as much as birth

and who knows
how much that is.
Your inner life,
I didn’t know you,

connected to mine.
The point of it, Bitter Wit,
is to rid me, Inner Life,
of tenderness toward you.
 
Cocklebur, Milkweed.
Lamb’s-quarter, Wild Carrot Seed.
No place for them
and they grow.