Aquarius

I know he’s Ganymede, another gorgeous
bum-boy of the Gods, but we all
have our own mythologies
and water makes me think of women.

Maybe it’s the spill and torrent of hair
as she bends to a kiss,
or the billows of her body
breaking over my groyne,
or the tempests of tears that
undermine my foundations, or
the drip, drip, drip of her passion slowly
weathering my stone.

Times she will talk like a river in spate
--crushing, churning, heaving
great boulders of thought—
into which I daresn’t step:
but rivers become seas become Ocean;
chaos, commingled, calms;
and the oily slap of home waters
rocks my dark hull to deep sleep.

There was a girl from Canada, once
who wished for a river: this one?
Eridanus? flowing from the cup,
in which whales and southern fishes swim?
Maybe not: she wanted to skate away
avoiding the buoys and
making me smile by saying
“Boo-eys”, not “boys”.