When sleep dissolved that super-Freudian dream
where featherless harpies mated while they fed,
I could not find my body: but a thread
of blood on fabled stairs, through mist and steam,
led to a hall of legend. There, in the gleam
of Kubla's lamps, my table-seated head
in gem-bright goblets lazuline and red
saw essences Falernian fall and cream,
self-poured, with cans of seething beer. Beyond,
in balconies that craned on vacant skies,
one booted leg went striding sentry-wise.
It was my own. It guarded with strict care
my heart, a sanguine, ice-girt diamond
imprisoned in some crystal frigidaire.