Perfect Lilacs

                                Perfect Lilacs


there is a jar on the window sill,
yesterday it was foaming-over
with the drunken aroma of the first
lilacs of spring;
but this afternoon it is a too perfect
purple shawl, soaked in tears and blood,
just bleeding there, in the latening sun,
like the perfect perfume
for a funeral.

there is a moment, in the sickening
center of the heart, when all the valves
stick shut, all the perfect pressure
stops, and only the memory of a woman's eyes
once warm with wizened wonder
for you, and the love she felt, recalls
that empty, silent moment when you can't
find that love, anymore.

and this afternoon, as i washed
the empty jar, sunlight betraying my perfect solitude,
all the bloody love running down
the drain, again and again, swirling in my brain
like a perfect, broken picture, burnt at the edges
in my heart, always;

there is a moment before the digital clock
clicks, when the perfect heart stops,
and sticks-- there is a moment of, yes,
there is a moment, when the empty jar
still smells of lilac.