With age she’s found an orient
in the self possessed dancer who stands
taut like blonde wheat
her shoulders remind me of water
causing the sharpness of stone to soften
her clavicle bones, two emotions
running together
I will always sit
on the opposite end of the table
and fall in line, slipping my
baser urges into shade, though I
tremble to touch her energy
quick and nimble like wild fire
people and their oil mixed with water
even as they
flicker in and out
like old camera film run together
double exposure
different stories
I think
as my eyes follow her thoughts
catching on the windy day like
urgencies lost
of what might have been
in the solace of imagination
where I roam unbidden
a cough drop tasting of her mouth
rolled in mine, briefly finding, union
in that flung place, we are lying together
washed over with setting dusk
the outline of our desire
stark in relief
real flesh
living
real hours
spent burning with fever
for the evoking of her
hairline, how her cheek bones
catch light like
glasses of water might seem
gold dust to the thirsty
I suspect they have always
sought her surround
even as she laments losing
whatever that mercurial thing is
women possess
in easy abundance
as the slender cat will be
elegant even as it
reaches
to kill.