Dark Valentine

I bought for my love a Valentine’s card
shaped like a heart and frilled with lace,
a corny bit of doggerel inside
to show that I’m thinking of him.
 
The normalcy of that simple gesture
thrills me when, alone, I sit and think
about what’s brought me here, the single love
that could have saved my soul.
The rage relaxes then, a white dove
settles on my breast. Reposed in this dark flat,
I look out through the skylight and
am ready for another day. He’s not replied,
of course. It’s been eight years since I started.
 
But neither does he sic the pigs
on he who held him long ago, did each
and every thing with him, that summer we spent
in Aberaeron, the year after the towers fell
and indicated what would come for me,
the military gongs that rest unvarnished
in a drawer. ‘I’m not a queer’ he said, ‘or sick…’
 
Perhaps I was, or am, I just don’t know…
I haven’t made it since is all I know, with anyone
or anything. The stirrings just aren’t there,
not like when we were teenagers  
and I showed you my scars  
(I’m changing voice… but I’ve always
been talking to “you”, not “him”)
and you told me that you’d never been touched,
not hugged or kissed by mum or dad
one time that you recall. ‘I’ve got
the opposite problem’ I said,
‘I wish that I’d never been touched.’
 
We spent so much of that summer alone,
the holiday home abandoned by  
parents who’d see the town or visit friends,
leaving us to sew our oats
among the lasses Welsh and fair.
Dad would have killed me if he knew.
Perhaps he did, in some small way,
since once or twice he’d say
the time I spent with you was odd,
you’re just my cousin, after all…