IN A CAFE NEAR THE UNIVERSITY
Yeats, that passionate old bastard,
wrote about young women well.
Black gyres, ancient Irish politics,
were all for naught.
Faced with the grace and gait
of Colleen, his deep thought
was silly, like searching
through classical references
as you took the gentle pressure
of her breasts against your chest.
There’s a place for the dance in an old man.
Maybe young women are there for us,
like death, that we may smile slyly
at the effortless curve of her,
and ask ourselves, after a lifetime,
who is more helpless, who walks
beneath the grey clouds
like a promise constantly kept?