I don’t want to see you

https://www.kennethedwardhart.com/2012/01/16/282/

In the beginning it seemed like circumstances

had stacked the largest impediments before us

 but we reached an end,

 

 

 

 

He runs the summer night streets

jabs and dances past

invisible opponents.

In a wrap around skirt and bandana

 

 

She presents herself to him

If she grows unhappy, it will be because he’s taken her

She presents herself to him

Because she’s different now that she has him

She is alive and pliant, firm and damp

He needs her

Seaside Sketch

 

Still life blankets

concentrated on the brown skin shore

watching smiling circles

growing large and then smaller.

 

Kris runs to the waves and then sits

until the water kisses her and she yells “Yay!”

and runs back to her muddy brother Bobby’s holes in the sand

which he calls castles.

 

Lucille and Rosemary, greased for the sun

talk under the music

lying about their husbands, children and things that they don’t like.

 

The sun teases and pulls freckles

Like a mind remembering

 

Aunt Sophie, wrapped like a mummy,

on a plastic and metal chaise

disguising a flower sweetness, extinguishing.

 

Squealing delight

Miguel holds cold water over Immaculada’s chest

And chases her while Brad and Brian watch her champion ass

escaping happily.

 

Monica’s face got hit,

like a newly cracked facade,

she stares spitefully at strangers.

Her nose is sore and hot.

Then Sandy’s mother brings French fries,

ketchup and a cup of crushed ice.

 

James and Teresa reach for a sun

That trails like the veins of a feather.

 

Six- o’clock watchers

anciently stare to the water

like something that they don’t want to leave.

The crowd of boardwalk walkers

feel good about their showers and dry clothes

when they stare at the beach.

Since all love has a bit of the fairy tale to it, this story is like that.

 A nightingale found its way into the dream of a girl with an out to sea look in her eyes. In that place, where it didn’t matter that he was a bird and she was a  lady of the north country where the nightingale had never been.

 The bird wasn’t even sure how it found its way into the land of dreams, but once he saw her there he knew it was his fate to never wish to leave.

 The music of her laughter caused the beating of his heart to throb in his chest! The way that she held her head when she spoke caused song to explode from his breast. In this impossible land,  the bird told the girl of his love. He said that his life was now in her hands and delighted her with a dance that drew them into a sun-drenched sky. Their beauty was strong and exquisite but it hurt. Tender bruises were left. The girl was enthralled by this pretty bird and encouraged him to poke her with his beak.

 Again and again he played on her body, and again and again she would moan and beg. She needed the ecstasy and intimate tapping from her bird. She began to know the bird as her lover, and they shared the sweet green of hope. She wanted more and more new songs and all that he could make up.

 In her wake of a world,  men  would laugh at the silly fantasy of her thoughts. The one in particular, whom she had chosen as her own, tormented her about her tender feel for the bird. His problem was that she slept more and more. His fine, beautiful, young thing, slept to be with her bird . Enraptured, her bird would sing. He sang to her heart. He sang that she could also fly and that there was a place where they could nest. He would tap and sing and she would moan and laugh and know the feeling of dreams at their best.

 And so the bird and the girl planned her flight from the cold, waking world of the north. Her man grew suspicious of her constant drowse and the faraway look in her eyes. He wanted her.  And  now he had to deal with this bird.

 At first he gave her potions designed to deaden her time of sleep. But the bird, in his frantic need searched through layer after layer of darkness and flew so deep into the dream land that he could barely return. He found her and sang with tender love and pecked her flesh until she cried in their sweet, dark release.

 The man could see that his pills had not worked for now she was even more drowsy than before. She no longer looked to him with the soft pleading eyes that said he was her god. So, he bought more pills that would keep her awake, take her away from these dreams and the stupid thoughts that she should never have had.

 Each night and some days the bird flew deep in the dreams to find her but she wasn’t there. She wanted to sleep. The harsh light was painful in her eyes and her body longed for the pecking and the sound of the songs. Finally, she ran away so that she could sleep and be with her bird. They loved each other with abandon and joy and planned again for her escape.

 Now this man did not believe in the world of dreams. He was run by commerce and success. But he found those dark things that for a price would steal and smash. Those things that could raid the land of dreams and trace the place from where the bird flew. If he could get rid of the bird, she would be sad but  she would be his. Who knew what memories a woman carried in her head, and who really needed to cared?

 When the dream dogs found the bird they snapped at its wings and tied it down with twine. They barked and bayed and made ready to dine.

 Where does a bird find the strength to escape the dogs of dirty dreams? The bird let go of its worldly needs, and know it would never be allowed to return from the land of impossible dreams. It split its beak to rip through the twine and accepted the night as its home. All it would need were the visits from her, until they were left alone.

 The bird wandered and lived in the dark and it ate in the land of dreams. It knew it had seen the last of the sun and felt its last sweet breeze. It dreamed of the radiance that would flow from her eyes and basked in the warmth of her smile.

 All girls make decisions some day to wake up and accept what they are for real. Tearful, our girl promised the bird that he would live always in her soul. Then she told him sadly that she could not travel anymore to the place that was their own.

 The bird waited in sunless sky, in an empty cage that he chose. He doesn’t look up and he doesn’t look down and he hears her voice in his ears. She thinks quite privately to herself with a smile that he will remember her always.

An Unstable Balance

“What did you think would happen

when you said that you were mine?

 

Tell Me that you didn’t want me to possess you

or that you didn’t open yourself to my invasions.

Can you say that you didn’t flatter yourself

in the reflection of my obsession?”

 

Her queasy knowledge:

The sight of his hands is a bad dream.

A child’s cries intensify the room.

 

On the street, a changing light is quickly followed

by the insult of a horn.

Successful repetition assures almost everyone.