Night Dances

I thought I lived outside such music,
watching my beloved, yes, sure, gripped
or loosened, loosening and tightening his grip—

but there are darks into which
I find myself unloosed, pitched.
The chords thrumming in my chest a sick

careen from settled to unloosed.
It seems serene enough at first.
Fine to be wakeful and attentive, lost

at heart inside some song, aroused,
sentient in each swelling little vesicle—
then that knowledge goes all sour, soured

by anxiety and lust, anxiety not tamed by lust,
the self its own thick frame and limit,
and the soul at play against those walls, a ghost.