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This poem is taken from PN Review 125, Volume 25 Number 3, January - February 1999.

Three Poems Paul Wilkins

Harvest, Late October

All sky pale grey, across the face a gauze of drizzle.
Anaesthetics of October.
Blur of the halved days...

Two approach a house and enter;
they go to a second-floor room.
One talks, one listens.

The yards darken;
a street-lamp throws a twisted sour diamond on the wall.
Hard to say how late it is.

Halfway back in their mouths the gin opens a sudden tang.
What is their luck, when one of them presses a button
and the Spring sonata starts?

And later they take off clothes and move against each other
in smudged anticipation, in fidelity.
And still they are not saved.

They have by heart their exhausted stories
...


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