sometime love is greater than a man’s convictions.”
                                      – Isaac Bashevis Singer 

1.

Hungrily we touch
                      each
 
             other
                    
                         between
                            each other’s
                                     legs.
 
How comforting
                 this is to us,
 
      to love
 
  without armies or tanks
     or
              Generals
 
                 of reasoned
                               love-
 
 
 
2
 
From the narrow street,
            they can see us
 
              wrestling with an angel -
                              the tugging of  limbs  -    
 
You speak low so they can’t hear
                      your talk
 
                                of revolutions
                                         for love.
                   
My hands
       get tangled
            in your low singing -
 
                while I hold you down
                              to the bed.
            
                     My captive.
 
                          The occupation has begun —
                              your occupied body
                          
                                   my country of  sad ardent
                                                                         birds.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 3.  
They are all leaving
this morning,
                                     for the front.
Not us,
    we will stay
                   and wage
                                a war
 
of tenderness.
 
They are all leaving
                     this morning .
 
                             Give them applause for their
sad theater,
          and all their war flags and planes.
 
 
They will write letters
           home
               which will arrive
 
without them.
                              but a few
will return,
 
return gaunt;  much less,
than before
 
with more sadness
   and less
           dancing.
 
and when they do
 
     our war
               will have ended
                         
                           with a flag of white
                                   bed sheets,
 
only a little blood,
 
               writing love letters
                              on each other’s bodies.