In Praise of Pain

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A brilliance takes up residence in flaws—
a brilliance all the unchipped faces of design 
refuse. The wine collects its starlets
at a lip's fault, sunlight where the nicked 
glass angles, and affection where the eye 
is least correctable, where arrows of
unquivered light are lodged, where someone 
else's eyes have come to be concerned.

For beauty's sake, assault and drive and burn 
the devil from the simply perfect sun. 
Demand a birthmark on the skin of love, 
a tremble in the touch, in come a cry, 
and let the silverware of nights be flecked, 
the moon pocked to distribute more or less 
indwelling alloys of its dim and shine 
by nip and tuck, by chance's dance of laws.

The brightness drawn and quartered on a sheet, 
the moment cracked upon a bed, will last 
as if you soldered them with moon and flux. 
And break the bottle of the eye to see
what lights are spun of accident and glass.

© Heather McHugh