It will be dark now, down that darkling street,
as you plow homeward from furtive trysts,
free of frailty, toward hearth's redemption,
saying and believing, O, the flesh is weak.
Now your shirtsleeves brush sooted buildings
against whose backs she leaned and wept,
your heels fill grooves that her feet etched,
for all the city's her body and scent.

The path to gray apartments will divide;
you'll knock on someone's door and another
will take you inside. Limbs will confuse
like golden chains at a casket's core.
The light her gems reflect trick the architect
at the center of his labyrinthine plan.
The more you know, the less you feel:
you stand alone with your infidelities.

From one woman to another to another woman,
Wife, Mistress, Mother, she'll reclaim your sins
and give them grace. In flight, you'll see amid lime
and granite, sure, climbing towers taller than man,
consubstantial with him; but her strong legs
are the girders of your dreams, your monuments.
What sends you away? O, your flesh is weak,
and the city's gifts are seductive and real.

Beyond the walls of the city of man
simmers promise of a cleansing, rising sun
whose every gentle shadow blankets every harm,
forgives trespass on hallowed ground sealed by cement.
Even as she vanishes before your restlessness,
she recalls what you confessed. The imperceptible
smiles of pavement cracks check your steps.
Forever stranger, in betrayal loving. Merciless.