Lily

Lily 

In the French restaurant you asked me if you

would have to eat snails,

And I told you “no” but there might be steak with sauce.

The French and their sauces which - if separated - represent failure, lack of intuition;

If intact - the glorious balance of being unbroken.

But alas, you do not like steak with sauce,

Or separation - or divorce - or the feeling of not being so young and so able. 

Your freckle, fine face is just here and 

Still so frail but lights at the prospect of cracking the brûlée. 

Lily, it will not be that separation can be remedied with an extra egg yolk,

Or the cloying of effort and awkward whisking conversations, 

But it will be necessary at some point 

To accept defeat and crack the shell and admit

That life is sweetest when it is barely burnt.