Still-Life

Life hangs in air like a translucent weight
ponderous, dull brown, tepid air of spring
laments through ornamental landscapes,
clustering around my head, grunting oracles.
Lesions and liaisons, phoney fellowships;
no one traces the fading brightness on
rosy neck, slow decay of fostering heart.
Caught between the crumbling beams of
a majestic monument, I am the frail vine,
twisting and waving, swinging to be free;
my tattered body, too green to be wizened.