If there were dancers, they were not dancing. If there was a tree,
It had not emerged from the rock. Potential was enough.
Fish, if there were fish, confined themselves discreetly to the dark
Angles in the shadow of the overhang, if the moon was out
For casting shadows. (Say, for the sake of the moment, it was.)

In the presence of the dust, we celebrated our return
To sanity. It was the dust we tasted on each other's skin-
You could say we made mud of it. Adapting our accustomed
Falsehoods to the requirement of the time, we reduced each other's
Serious intensity to laughter, an excuse for tears.

If there was a clock, hidden under blankets in a basket
Or thieved by brigands in the night, it would not for want of winding
Stop.We were reconciled to that. I slept in your armpit, dreaming,
If there were dreams, of you: you in the mountains, you on horseback,
you at the cash-and-carry.There was a sentence which recurred
...