Camden's Song

Through a covered bridge
I see you,
through a streaky mirror
I glimpse, and love you.
A sigh sounds, blush in a powder room.

Through a pastoral scene,
I bid you “hello.”
On a linoleum floor
we take flight in a union hall.
—Give me your hand. Let’s have a ball.

Through a covered bridge
we’re shut up from a storm.
In a covered wagon I fall for a whore.
The movies we know
play on, and the Apache make war.

I’ll take mention of Rahab,
she paid a brute to pull me from a cistern
in a basket,
just to fashion me a dagger made of
clay.

Her rattling candelabra
shone umbrageous light, goading me
to loose the gate.

Through a covered bridge
I know you.
In a streak of sunshine your gold’s shown,
I smell you.

All the flowers we know, like rare, pale, peonies of jade;
tempted to despair—they pass away.
But I’ve retrieved them faithfully
before. I recognize them now—years on.

(June 2025)