1. his heart ever dancing
I’d seen you before, though the where is unsure,
Not in a crowd or a place
Or a playground, but inside, that space
Where impossible dreams, unafraid, occur:
Where all that you are finds itself not far,
Already there in a space
Without fear or pause, a hidden place
Left on the other side of the night, a jar
Closed tight in the day, hermetic, a way
To protect ourselves, ensure
Lines won’t be crossed: keep distant the lure
Of hope, quiet, name it as fable, at bay –
So was I, to, cast, hope contained in rhymes past,
Sipping tea, ‘til you stepped through that entrance,
Not door: though my lines had a semblance,
Subtle change began: you brought me here, so fast,
That light enveloping, creating, expanding,
Expounding, from you and your smiling
Dark eyes, and hair, and way of standing:
You walked in, and in, and in more, all my fears fading,
My rules dis-ruled: only blending, with no more pretending
False pretense – I left other endings.
My heart flew with your smiling, reversing
My self: with your eyes replacing, like budding
Flowers un-budding, the sun’s warmth transforming,
The first time I saw you unending,
Still here, now still, that flower un-wilting,
For you have no end. My heart goes on dancing.
2. her heart ever laughing
I was sitting so-o usually, time ticking through normally –
Make no mistake: I was spending my days happily
Unenchanted, doing the same things comfortably,
Almost, waiting for coming nights patiently,
For I am a patient girl, or girlish then, and made love slowly
With those boys I was sharing my youth-bound body with, youthfully –
Those thoughts, to, passed through me un-quietly
As I and a he were sipping our coffee and tea, neutrally,
At that square-shaped table that faced the entrance distantly,
That faced a sun setting early, in such winter days, coldly
Fixing my white-smooth skin within woolen sweaters hastily
Chosen, sexy wreckage draping itself invitingly,
Following a different night’s forms, charms, arms –
We’d finished our drinks and walked into the dark, when
My having forgotten a favorite scarf raised an alarm –
I turned away from him, and crossed into that then
Which became another, another then, and again
Another then, and then, and more then – for once through the door,
I scanned directly the table I’d left, and met you where I’d been.
The domain of myself dissolved, in reverse, like a flower
Opening itself in early spring: at once rhyming sunshine and being
New – delicate warmth coaxing the bud to more fragrant self-becoming,
Like a major chorus after a minored verse, harmonizing,
Growing with the wet soil from which it’s springing,
I knew, so-o completely, the feeling, your gray-blue eyes completing
Where I was going, in whose arms my rhythm, our dancing, a dizzy
Entwinement of rhyming spinning, spun and dipping, embracing and
lifting,
The days ever rising, the nights ever holding. My heart goes on laughing.
3. the world is full of teapots
Of course they do:
She finds it near, barely a pause away;
He, half a step to his left, that feeling,
The moment lingering, years on.
Decades have passed with little recollected –
After all, what mattered? Which war,
Which new disaster floating through the times,
Who won the White House, the parliament, Miss America
The World Cup, but – in a cool January late afternoon,
They have tea, again, as then –
Lipton Green, Classic. Some things become
The start of the feeling that tied them
As forever may be, to forever,
To each, to both, to then, always
A pause away, a half step left, lingering again,
She crossing over, leaving disenchantment at the door,
Turning herself on, bringing her self to him,
Resting beside where she knew she’d remain,
Sipping tea, (Lipton Green, Classic – some things,)
From the same cup.
I was there, in the tea, in the cup, in the metal pot,
In their drawn mouths – all at once, then,
And all at once, here; all at once in them,
And all at once outside; all at once in
Their minds and tongues, and all at once
In the pot on the table across the way, (Lipton, still, black. Other things,
to, in other places,)
And on the other tongues of the three of them up there, see there,
The light in the window on the third floor; and again across a longer way,
To faraway thens and heres, each a little different,
Each the same, each hearing the rest, across the all the time in the
world.
(artwork by Giulia Neri)