The Coward’s Lament

Beneath the waning amber light
a hand is offered from inside smoke;
where silly plans of love are scattered,
hoarse cries float from scarlet tongues;
the Ginastera piano plays,
her weightless ways’ embodiment.
“Dance,” - she puts down her Quentão -
“Dance,” she says, “dance!”, and I say, “No.”
A pallid hand bids me rise: seventy
prayers recalled in blank futility;
I reject ascension, opt for humility,
while the chandelier unfurls its light.

It’s worse than dread of endless night,
this offered hand veiled by smoke…
the fruit of Colombus, the red ruby ring
sneer “Why now the gut clenched so tight?”
Hooked instead by a darker hand,
these spinning dances entice recall
of untaken chances; a sacred hand offered
in eternity’s stint, and yet I spurned
ascension; as the bulbs discharge hostilities,
Our Woman or the Silver Mountains,
she is spun, heaved,
in mockery of a coward’s heart.