Nicole's Love Song

(image credit)

On an elbow, chin on palm,

I recall how desolate

What seemed that perpetual

Zürich dusk, odd silhouette

Of bare trees against the sky

For the isolated eye.

Evening was not quite the calm

Where some dreaded fear became

Definite once and for all

That the introverted can

Cling to with maternal grace.

Silence had a sound at lame

Lonely moments, moments when

It was chatter come like odd

Comfort, at times willowy

Whispering like douce ennui,

Sweet loss of all touch and care –

Till returning back to face

Myself as myself, despair

That could only turn to God.

Nicole's Love Song © Ron Villejo

I read three of F Scott Fitzgerald's mere handful of novels, and Tender is the Night stood out for me.  It was an autobiography of sorts: Fitzgerald in the rising psychoanalyst Dick Diver, and wife Zelda in the troubled Nicole.  The trochaic meter and rhyme scheme are modeled after those of WH Auden.  I began to write it in April 1982 and finished it a year later.