I personally have always had trouble with the phrase

 

            Because it made me think of some thing

            And I could never figure out exactly what:

 

            Was it a hunk of dough to be kneaded and baked

            Just right, or else?

 

            A widget that could roll off an assembly line

            Like so, and that was that?

 

            It definitely couldn’t be bottled –

            That I was sure of –

            Or sold to anyone else

            Because its shelf-life was way too short

 

            You might argue that it was a piece of performance art

            To be devised together, a collaboration, sort of,

            That didn’t happen very often between two real artists,

            Each with strong minds and even stronger ideas

            About what kind of house of card tricks fit the bill

 

            Whatever it was I did get the impression

            That it could easily grow stale, become mechanical

            Or lose its mystery

            And on top of all that

            Unless it kept happening with a certain frequency

            (On which nobody could ever quite agree

            And, believe me, I’ve asked around)

            The chances of its happening again

            Shrank to nil

 

            You can see why

            When it came to pondering ingredients

            I was at a loss

 

            Until one lazy afternoon

            She took me unawares

            And –

 

            (and here I was just about to say

            that one thing led to another

            but it’s not true!) –

 

            Our thousand playful conjurings,

            Reckless as the dew,

            Grew immaterial