In Her Nocturnal Gardens Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Don't you know what the queen remembers?
I have gone to the liquor store and tomorrow will be
My birthday—
Another birthday and I will keep with the kids at school:
Having drunken so much rum from Barbados,
How will I explain to them tomorrow what they cannot
Feel—the aesthetic of my vanishing muses—
Now that I am married and another year older—
Even one year older than the God of Easter,
Will I keep the ventriloquisms of my art:
Of stolen bicycles and terrapin with cerulean shells,
And stewardesses who fly forever on airplanes
Until they are kidnapped into the vineyards of venal foxes:
I do not know—but the waves swell with mermaids:
Don't you know—they are just as popular with the sea
As the people in red China where my wife lips:
Tiny as a sea shell, I put her in my pocket—a wish worth
At least one candle—
As I walk away with the sunset—as the moon cleans my
Pockets, shining like a leopard
In her nocturnal gardens.