Advice

You were a sophist,
Pale and quite remote, 
As you bade me
Write poems—
Brown poems 
Of dark words
And prehistoric rhythms . . . 
Your pallor stifled my poesy 
But I remembered a tapestry
That I would some day weave 
Of dim purples and fine reds
And blues 
Like night and death—
The keen precision of your words 
Wove a silver thread 
Through the dusk softness 
Of my dream-stuff. . . .