I just can't resist a sestina..

I took up my own assignment...

A Separate Grief

Whoever had any doubt the ruler
Of summer’s margins, the ruby robin
Of song, would return with its proud largesse
Of eggs and cluster its nest with garnet
Telltales of broken shells! sang the vodka
From my martini glass in Malibu.

And so January in Malibu –
Her voice on the phone, the flat of a ruler
Slapping a tabletop: “The first robin
Arrived today,” said alimony’s largesse.
I watched the swimming pool shimmer garnet
On my ceiling. “You still hit the vodka?”

“I do,” I said. My marriage to vodka
Brought me to ruin and to Malibu
After divorce became the sad ruler
Of single days – more raven than robin –
Its black division subtracting largesse
From sad California skies washed in garnet.

“It’s funny, I think about the garnet
I gave you for…” I sip hard my vodka –
“…before Ike died.” My words in Malibu
Meet with silence. Death on wings, the ruler
Of distance, has killed the ragged robin
With snowstorms like scarlet fever’s largesse.

“Don’t.” She pleads with me, but there’s no largesse
As gaping as grief. “Remember that garnet?”
I watch ice cubes bleed into my vodka.
She responds, “I do.” And then Malibu
Weds sun to sea and sunset is ruler
Of evening’s despair. “Today, the robin

“Returned,” she repeats. “It seems the same robin
Ike had seen his first day sick.” What largesse
Giveth, I thought… “Let’s stick with the garnet,”
I rush her words. “You stick with your vodka,”
She retorts, “and…and…” “Stay here in Malibu?”
I hung it up for her. When did I rule her

Out of bounds? When did the robin’s largesse
Exile this poor ruler to Malibu?
That day she dropped the garnet in my vodka.