My lines were smooth and clean back then.
A careful paint, a cunning bra, a well cut shift,
I could pass and raise a tempted brow.

You needed no such subterfuge, my lovely beaux.
So handsome and strong, you made women weep,
thinking they should have my place.

We'd stroll the latest clubs, hand in hand,
nodding a haughty, spare address to those favored few,
then hurry home to feast upon ourselves.

It was a private irony that I was your étalon femelle
and you my willing mare, desperate to be mounted
and ridden hard to ecstasy.

But such is youth and those golden times soon gave way
to a life of simple constancy, hidden, but shared together
in bliss and strife and memory.

Now I look across the sunlit room to where you always sit,
drowsing over the morning rag and a mug of lukewarm tea,
and wonder again how we made it through.

"Love, you silly thing," you mumble, reading my mind.
"Nothing else is strong enough to let me live this long,
blessed with the likes of you."