Listening (to a nightingale)

Beaker pouring Bacchus darkness -
vain midnight air that flowers at the mouth
is the murmurous coming of a requiem,
a dream anthem.

Light, spectre-thin, seems to envy -
alien-pale in night,
no beauty, she.

I think of numbness,
my soul mossy in unseen summer
dim amid starry song.

Drunk, or happy, or a child,
half-known Poesy perplexes me
(tender plot that drains the breath).

But beyond names is buried heaven,
waking to the self-same song.