You were not to know

I don't know about you. 
But I was a romantic idealist
and made myself very miserable with unrealistic expectations and wistful longing.
Perhaps these are features of youth?

You were not to know

You were not to know

that I was in an invisible shell.

Dwarfs lacking, you couldn’t see

The glass box, open tomb, flower strewn

Where I lay waiting for Count Almasy,

Heathcliff or even Cliff Richard

To bestow the kiss that would crack the spell.

You didn’t know that I would misconstrue

Your stray sonnets and deep sighs

And expect you to hack your way through decades of thick brooding.

Being of a more prosaic mind,

You said goodbye.

So I had my tomb reinforced, double glazed, lead fortified

and wallowed, for a decade or two longer.

Copyright with Cathy Leonard 2016

Count Almasy.?..See The English Patient

http://www.amazon.com/English-Patient-Ralph-Fiennes/dp/6304806426