Humbert's Muse

A wonderfully lurid image, reminiscent of "...that book
by Nabokov".
"One thread of paradise
is woven in her dress.
But only one.  I turn over
the fabric while she's gone.
And I've lived all my life
learning how to endure pain,
how to sit in cheap hotels
and not ask, and be
empty like the bottle,
naked like the chair, narrow
like the crack in the thin cold wall."

PARADISE Dennis Nurkse