He wears night's cloak
As shield against the cool indifference
And walks the wards of the dispassionate Infirmary,
Takes comfort from its dark recesses and cadence of slow
Melancholy;
From door to door, there is no solid form
But paradigms of forms supine,
Bedding entwined upon frameworks of slippery humanity.

His movements doubly shadowed by low lamps
Cast long down halls like waters washing back
the tides of human frailty;
He turns into a doorless corridor
When from the dark appears a Figure moreforlorn
Whose asthene visage is silhouetted against
A portal backlit by the setting moon.

Acidic rays do etch the borders of her Finality,
Stark remnant of the ravaged temple she once dwelled within;
She bears in hapless hand a chalice of gold fine
And lifting scatters beams of silver symmetry
Through gown atattered and worn thin;
Blue lapis circumscribes the base and
Cabochon blood-ruby sits at mid the bowl Divine.

An inscription lettered worn, obscure reads "Sacre Coeur"
This she offers up to him and murmurs prayer:
"Behold all that remains, my essence,
my threadbare soul within—show thy love and keep this well."

With hands uncloaked it passes'tween the two and
Communion of mortality transpires;
no more;
At setting moon she ebbs on whispers of the dawn
And he, sad keeper, remains, amid the empty and
forgotten morn.