No bed of roses for to sleep

No bed of roses for to sleep

The velvet clover days

enchantment have waned ,

milk and honey dried

where the silence echoes

spurned throes

of wintertide

Cold and lonely

daybreak ,

there is no longer

bed of roses

for to lay upon

petaled amazing

grace

Dawn's fog clears

its multihued shades

of monotone grey

yet ,

the weather

has no affect

on the dolor

of yesterday's love ,

a changing season

grown cold

The icebound river

flows not

unto the sea’s

frigid tideways ,

barren estuaries

The bitter east wind

won’t blow away

this benumbing ,

forsaken loneliness ,

beyond the fallow

winter wasteland ;

purge your season's

haunting memory ,

footprints bereft traces

hopelessly lead me on

        Sing you a little prayer  . . .

bestow a frozen river

to skate away on ,

back to a sea of humanity

helplessly adrift

       whence you came  . . .

Harlon Rivers ..... ©January 26th , 2014