Rite of Passage

When he steals into my body’s old temple
My subversive lover stands
For a minute of silence
Before his dance of death begins
With the beating of drums
Followed by the stillness of a lotus on a pond
And the sound of a woodpecker tapping on a tree.
 
Avatar of youth that has passed me by,
Devil dancer who expels with a flaming brand
The troubles that plague me,
Healer, whose fingertips
Regenerate my fabric of decay,
He comes with tom-toms loud as thunder
Exploding across a river that has burst its banks.
 
Prostrate among the ruins of his making
He reclines in the for ever of my love
As a lotus planted in memory
Till the ringing of a cell phone
Calls him away
Leaving me drenched
In his dark aroma of godlike indifference.