The Furious Gazelle is continuing to serialize Charles Bane’s new book of poetry, Love Poems. You can find more of his poetry here.

Goodnight

Goodnight, my love
sleep here beside me
my lifelong man. My
champion who hurls against
cobblestones the fears I reserve
for he, whose shoulders arch
city streets and deeper still
on concourses of sheets. I wonder
which of his ribs made me. Dust
settles in the sky as we name
fleeting things we have seen.
Light will dim eventually my
compass, glass and archer and
I will streak west contentedly.

For e.e. cummings

Fleeter be they than dappled
dreams, and every word for
Marion is such and every day;
when I was lean and long
and words scraped against
the city skies of pages one
foot high, I raced in swimming
meets; the whistle blew and
I churned, arms winding like second
hands but really my joy propelled
me down the aisle as I thought
that time was not like her who I
would immortalize like air.

Charles Bane, Jr. is the American author of The Chapbook ( Curbside Splendor, 2011) and Love Poems ( Kelsay Books, 2014). His work was described by the Huffington Post as “not only standing on the shoulders of giants, but shrinking them.” A writing contributor for The Gutenberg Project, he is a current nominee as Poet Laureate of Florida.