With you my dear I intend this night to get perfectly drunk—
How often have you and I, seated across this table,
Tippled the white or the red or the gold, while the stars have sunk
Under the hill—till we made our way (as best we were able)
To the place where we sealed our joys, for that time. Ah, the years of our love,
That built our lives and our world; we drank, saw the twilight thicken,
And loved again, in all safety; small fear that the future would prove
Any but slow fulfilment. Slow years—but slow you were stricken.
Now, all that seems at an end: all seems, but it is not dead,
And I’ll drink with you still, my love, till I slip to my ultimate bed.
September--October 2005