The Society

you were there and you remember

how it was: that high room with the tall chairs

and bar and open windows

she was there: standing at the window,

taken by the sunset's glory.

when night settled in velvet folds she would be ours;

'til then she was just a small soft smile, a murmured reply,

a curve of close-cropped head, a sip of somber wine,

and a faraway gaze brimming with beheld beauty. you remember

he was there too, broad-grinning champagne,

leaping from group to group with a tongue

long enough to precede him with a pun or burst of wit

and his brother also: who aside in stillness and silence would keep

the spirit of our gathering as well as any

you remember what it was like when they were all there,

that feeling of coming home

after a long campaign, wanting toast and eggs

our bellies would be full with harbored joy, with weary laughter

our mouths with smoke and red herrings

we would speak for love of words

and hear for love of the rhetorician

and we only lied when we were silent

you were there and you remember

clouds reflecting on the hardwood floor before the windows

just before dark, and the crystal glinting on the tables

in the moonlight as we left

in the dark, smudged platters like palettes with steel-handled brushes lying beside

and two left behind dancing to quiet music

when we returned the candles were lit and their ghosts were in the panes

opinion and oratory created unity

our perhaps unsympathetic symposium burnt

what could not earn its place using the empty aspersorium beside the bar

but our short shelves were deep, and doors hidden behind

gave way to whole rooms of thirst and thought

and this was our business:

there the world was ordered and what it brought forth we named

what it teemed with we named

what it separated we named

to the clink of glass, the rustle of paper, the lolling of tongue

clumsy, black-thumbed gardeners

culling the firstborn like angels of death.

We were there and I too

complicit in what we did and what we decided

and what we divided; in that high open room shaking off our dust

as if forgotten oddities in an attic had finally come alive

to reconvene at the witching hour, if it were known,

and compose under our nom de plume

in a place with no wall that bore a clock,

and a small pile of watches in the anteroom all ticking alone

like a mound of baking soda waiting for vinegar

like unfollowed dreams

like the aftertastes of wine and wit when dawn glimmered beneath the stars.

Never was often enough, yet oftener would have broken hearts

and though we yawn we also yearn, as cats do

and we are all ever-pregnant with pretenses of busyness and lives to see to,

other troubles to quiet in other places

but you were there;

you remember.