Privilege of Being

Manyare making love. Up above, the angels

inthe unshaken ether and crystal of human longing

arebraiding one another’s hair, which is strawberry blond

andthe texture of cold rivers. They glance

downfrom time to time at the awkward ecstasy —

itmust look to them like featherless birds

splashingin the spring puddle of a bed —

andthen one woman, she is about to come,

peelsback the man’s shut eyelids and says,

lookat me, and he does. Or is it the man

tuggingthe curtain rope in that dark theater?

Anyway,they do, they look at each other;

twobeings with evolved eyes, rapacious,

startled,connected at the belly in an unbelievably sweet

lubriciousglue, stare at each other,

andthe angels are desolate. They hate it. They shudder pathetically

likelithographs of Victorian beggars

withperfect features and alabaster skin hawking rags

inthe lewd alleys of the novel.

Allof creation is offended by this distress.

Itis like the keening sound the moon makes sometimes,

rising.The lovers especially cannot bear it,

itfills them with unspeakable sadness, so that

theyclose their eyes again and hold each other, each

feelingthe mortal singularity of the body

theyhave enchanted out of death for an hour or so,

andone day, running at sunset, the woman says to the man,

Iwoke up feeling so sad this morning because I realized

thatyou could not, as much as I love you,

dearheart, cure my loneliness,

wherewithshe touched his cheek to reassure him

thatshe did not mean to hurt him with this truth,

andthe man is not hurt exactly,

heunderstands that life has limits, that people

dieyoung, fail at love,

failof their ambition. He runs beside her, he thinks

ofthe sadness they have gasped and crooned their way out of

coming,clutching each other with old, invented

formsof grace and clumsy gratitude, ready

tobe alone again, or dissatisfied, or merely

companionablelike the couples on the summer beach

Readingmagazine articles about intimacy between the sexes

tothemselves, and to each other,

andto the immense, illiterate, consoling angels.