Dear Sweetheart

Her body is not so white as

Anemone petals nor so smooth—nor

So remote a thing. It is a field

Of the wild carrot taking

The field by force; the grass

Do not raise above it.

Here is no question of whiteness,

White as can be, with a purple mole

At the center of each flower.

Each flower is a hand’s span

Of her whiteness. Wherever

His hand has lain there is

A tiny purple blossom under his touch

To which the fibers of her being

Stem one by one, each to its end,

Until the whole field is a

White desire, empty, a single stem,

A cluster, flower by flower,

A pious wish to whiteness gone over—

Or nothing.