Before or after Thunder

No one is so determined as lovers.
There need be no other body,
though it helps when a body’s young.
Iron will is a function of future
events: nothing possible
that’s not dreamed.

She said, "Believe it or not,
my life's based on a true story."
Though I believed her, she stayed
her tongue, save to speak to me
in original riddles.
She knows what she wants . . .

She knows what she’s had.
I was riding my horse alone
to Mexico. I packed enough
to last a year, maybe two.
Why do I stop along the way,
thinking of what I do not have?

My horse is not unhappy,
even if no other horses
travel this way.
We are headed for the village
where the women are lush
inside, blossoming all over.

Now I know only
a storm is next or the one to follow.
Plant wildflowers
to drink rain.
Rake over the seeds
so they can root.

You said there would always be
your true life, story or no.
You didn’t insist, I asked.
" Believe it or not"
gave me pause. I knew nothing . . .
How could I deny anything?

In Mexico there is always a language
I may never comprehend
let alone speak.
I will write the words
on paper, carve the letters in the dust.
There is nothing I cannot fathom.

It’s the body that worries me.
What can I do to satisfy
what was given me?
It is not my own. It can never live
alone now I know
I miss her soul.

We slide into our caves.
We sleep alone.
Nothing remains to be done
but this. Watch the way words
make a life come true.
There, I’ve said what else I know.

Mine was always the way
you must put dreams
before waking.
That way, sleep comes.
You can’t imagine one body
living without the other.

In Tehuantepec, women
run things. You have to be able
to love women to live there.
There are so few men
I may find a place of my own.
Then I can begin . . .

                                                            for Maria Teresa
(4 June 2011)

copyright 2011 by Floyce Alexander