Jading

Is it only yesterday we were young and you
showed me your first breasts
in the fields?

We only suspected their magic then, dis-
missed them with a laugh
playing instead among the trees
where the river ran

Now those trees are pale the
river is a lake
veiled like woman’s mourning face
beneath a web of wires
electric in the night
behind the dam

Now your breasts are full and I touch them
With not so shy
fingers

They are not magic anymore those breasts nor
my fingers nor
the river

--30— Montreal July 7, 1968