Every morning as I wake

And feel the swirling mists of morn

You are the first thing that I see.

And the last as well as I retire

And lay trembling in my rickety bed

Missing the velvet of your voice.

You are the stranger I fled from

Through all my childhood dreams

Creeping under the bed in fear.

United with me and my destiny

Tangled up in the skeins

Of my unromantic existence.

Perhaps you know me and mine

Quite as well as no one will

Sometimes that scares me too…

Deride me when I am drunk

Or eat a chocolate muffin too many

I might then agree that you are real.

Real. And not a djinn of the night

Haunting my consciousness

With your gleaming ebony skin.

Several ages of development have passed

And fairy stories are myths

And I am not a Cinderella.

But stewing softly in the hearth of my mind

With the ugly sisters of life about

Perhaps you may yet charm me…

But no, I will not idolize you

You have feet of clay as well

And I see you weeping in my dark…

And whispering memories of pain

That you and I would do well

To forget and efface.

Forget and efface. Can it be done?

But maybe we can stop looking back

And thumb Jim Porter in the eye.