Driss Ezzireg
This poem hasn't been published before.
What love?
Now that anger has simmered down
And angels have turned back to heart.
Visions of you smuggled from memory -
Light as a butterfly’s flight,
Pull me back to hurt times ago
When love was brother to bitterness.
What love can love bitter love?
That which saves face by killing innocence.
That which flaws the image of rapture.
So noble in appearance;
So ignoble in essence.
So sweet in fragrance it maddens.
So fleeting in sight insight it blinds.
What love can love bitter love?
You rode a strong tide.
I followed you for a season-
For no truthful reason.
Your road led to a dead end;
I had to bend low and build fences:
Circumstances make offences.
Regrets won’t make amends.
Now the veil has covered up your face
And my body is about to surrender.
What love can love bitter love?
I wonder… I wonder…