Crystal

BETWEEN your laughter and mine

Lies the shadow of the sword of change.

Yours is innocent.

Mine knows.

You had sat abstracted

By the touch of dreaming strings

Of an old guitar—

When in the centre of the room

A crystal dish cracked for no reason.

Then you darted with joy to the fragments,

Like a fish to a crumb,

And held between your thumbs and your fingers

Two pieces of laughter.