Nobody believes in love- <br />not even me. <br /> <br />Love is the thing <br />you wait <br />to end. <br /> <br />Love is the thing <br />that will not, <br />cannot work. <br /> <br />Love is the thing <br />they warn you of- <br />the dire parents, <br />the friends <br />with their dead <br />marriages, <br />their crushed hopes. <br /> <br />Nothing crushes hope <br />but the will to make <br />the heart <br />like rock. <br /> <br />That will is strong. <br /> <br />The rock-heart stands <br />when the love songs crumble, <br />their yellowing sheet music <br />kept in a drawer, <br />their sweet hugs & tugs <br />forgotten, <br />like the merest air <br />of an old New England <br />spring. <br /> <br />Spring comes again <br />& again, <br />& the rock-hearts <br />feel the sap rising <br />thinking it is sex, <br />thinking the glands alone <br />cause this tumult <br />to the innards, <br />this hidden spring, <br />this secret river <br />which is hope. <br /> <br />Let them put it down <br />to sex! <br /> <br />Let them say <br />we worship Dionysus, <br />Bacchus, Pan, <br />but not the proper <br />gods. <br /> <br />Let them have <br />the proper gods- <br />Jahweh <br />with his heart like rock, <br />Christ with his blood <br />& thorns, <br />Mammon with his stock certificates, <br />his rates, his rates, <br />his bull markets, <br />& his late rallies. <br /> <br />We are rallying <br />alone. <br />We spit our love <br />into the wind. <br /> <br />Nobody can bear <br />to watch <br />our love. <br /> <br />Except the muse <br />who smiles <br />& sends <br /> <br />these <br />poems.<br /><br />Erica Jong<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/nobody-believes-2/
