Thank you.
This is a little poem which plays around with cliches.
It's called "Adage."
"When it's late at night and branches
are banging against the windows, you
might think that love is just a matter of leaping out
of the frying pan of yourself into the fire of someone else,
but it's a little more complicated than that.
It's more like trading the two birds who
might be hiding in that bush for the one
you are not holding in your hand.
A wise man once said that love was
like forcing a horse to drink but then
everyone stopped thinking of him as wise.
Let us be clear about something.
Love is not as simple as getting up
on the wrong side of the bed wearing the emperor's clothes.
No, it's more like the way the pen feels after it
has defeated the sword.
It's a little like the penny saved
or the nine dropped stitches.
You look at me through the halo of the last candle
and tell me that love is an ill wind that
has no turning, a road that blows no good,
but I am here to remind you, as our shadows
tremble on the walls, that love is the early bird who
is better late than never."