gossamer in the crown

Of curses, calluses and diligent craft,
        Your cozy corner was squared and coped;
            Strung you are in void of draft
    Among that adornment of scroll-work sloped,
        Hassle-fitted, slow-hand-hewn;
        Anchored in the first fillet
    And swaylessly to the height of moulded cap,
            Just beneath your cyma-recta roof,
        You hung so daintily a delicate deathtrap—
Spun such an oddest, spartanly modest, hubris-mummifying home.

A creature hidden in the comfort as proof
        Friends are over for dinner just once;
            Rare they are who fly aloof,
    But you’re an opportunist for gone-wrong stunts.
        And, for that, I’m in-factly thankful:
        I hate the fly, loathe the gnat
    And would swat a lion for a mosquito,
            Take to swinging a Louisville bat
        At any sting beyond my gimp aikido—
The enemy of my enemy is my friend, maybe-so it then.

As I you, leave me to live on your ceiling
        And, between us, well enough alone.
            If you mirror the feeling,
    Neither of us need unass our throne;
        We earned it in work and it owes us rest.
        I won’t ask you to come down
    If you won’t ask me to broom with bristles up;
            Your gossamer can reign in my crown
        If you’ll not sip my dreams from your silken cup—
Left you are to lord overhead; left am I to better make my bed.