In A Place We Can Never Go Poem by Robert Rorabeck

My false promises burn with their adolescent
Stupidity:
They have been truants again, reading Stevens in the park
Of their transcendences:
But not understanding any of him: wanting to come on to
Alma,
Wanting to be her fairytale and to swim with her
Through the white bred canals,
And look up open mouthed through the spindling entrails of the
Clouds:
Oh, I am afraid that I have failed you again, dear Alma,
My dear:
I am just afraid of that black knight who is your husband as
You are,
I fear:
I do not have the girdle needed to brashly cut the dragon’s
Sultry neck,
But we can run away together and play cowboys and Indians:
We can bring your children with us and feed them
Holy milk like woebegone kittens,
And I can hold your brown hand out beside the summer pool,
In a place we can never go to, but isn’t far from here.