My soul
	Is skin and bones,
	Starved for
	The special wonder
	It used to know.
	The angels
	Will speak no more
	To it,
	Since I turned away
	From the glistening gardens
	Of heaven
	To play amidst
	The mud and muck
	Of the earth.
	Girls with ribbons
	In their hair,
	Blossoms whose velvet colors
	Once stroked my eyes,
	Dogs that licked
	My face and hands for joy--
	All these are gone.
	Ethereal bones
	Support the weightless shroud
	That once swelled
	With Life.
	Now I am abandoned,
	Just as I abandoned
	All that once
	Was sweet and dear.

	4/21/76