Fascicle [13]

thirteen

This’s a young man’s game, like dominos
is for the father, like chess for his mate,
her chiseled nose and lips, the morning glow
in her eyes, who loves to walk through the night
naked in her youth but not now, not when
her mind is on her work, staying alive.

Last chance hegira . . . Esperanza says:
I think of the Santa Fe street corner
in that painting you said you remember
well. Ever since the moment you said that
I imagined remembering I was
visible there in the painting with you.

There is no way to get to her from here.
Rivers overflow, wind tears down a sky
lovers need, earth opens. You will believe
others know what they mean when branding you
a madman. The one waiting calls their bluff:
They brand you what they know themselves to be.

She gathers her skin with her fluid hands,
gives me food and drink, opening her legs,
and the past is past, this is the future’s
future. Who would not follow your fire here?
I doubt I will go back, it is too late
once she moves her flesh in waves over me.

(20 September 2013)

copyright 2013 by Floyce Alexander