Should I flatter you with flowered phrases
plucked from the lines of a thousand love songs?
Should I prate lyrics about your graces,
mope wanly, say where the heart belongs?
Should I send flowers, buy chocolates, and drinks,
try the games of chance, win carnival toys?
Should I hurl myself toward maudlin brinks,
in short behave like all heat crazed boys?
Honest words are what I proffer, plain cut,
home spun, rough woven, worn down with use,
to no more effect than lake drowned stones.
Slience: keen edged careless words cleanly cut
hopes’ threads to fall back into disuse.
Again I ask, what harm in a heart of stone?