This morning drenched our little world-
Fogged our vision driving in,
As the wind blew the water sideways in sheets
Which threw themselves against the windshield:
THWAPP
THWAPP
THWAPP.

The wipers fought a losing battle:
FSH-erhh
FSH-erhh
FSH-erhh.

Stepping out the driver's side door
Was like having walked the plank
And reached the end,
Emerging into nothingness,
And then endless water.

Wool socks were damp for hours
Souls were exhilarated, voices tittering ironically joyful grousings.
"Can you believe this weather?"

How can one as pure as you
Endure these times, emerge unmarked?

You seem to live apart
From all this pain and loss
Evil and filth

I can't extricate myself
From this quicksand-sin

And none have trod upon your heart;
It's still full of helium and joy
And sweetness and light
And love- for me!

Laying here with you
Under the paper-thin gossamer canopy
(Providing protection from nasty dreams)
I think how much I love you,
Love us.

I roll over and kiss your clean white linen shoulder
You giggle
I breathe in your sweet smell.

The tentative contact of your full smooth lips,
Your quick shallow breaths and cold white hands
Are more wonderful than the touch of any other.

The candle burning softly on the nightstand
And the musicians singing from the corner of the room
Bring us to a better place;
We're all we need.

Things aren't what they were
And they won't be.

We are the ever-living ghost of what once was
And we're everything
But we aren't anything.

Your hard square hands
Won't move over that scrawny frame
With its gently rounded hips and healthy little *******
Again.

And the cold little chapped pink lips
Won't brush yours: warm, soft, full.

Still, something from you pulls me
The way the moon tugs on the sea
And I know you know how much we took for granted.

Onward, now,
To new,
Better?
Other
Things.

Such solidarity we created
On the hilltop with the cows

Discussing sassafras,
Our Chakras,
Summer-berry wine.

Per aspera ad astra
But without inhaling tar
We have come.

The cornbread with anise and wheat berries
Cruncy and sweet
Slathered with strawberry jam
Was such a luxurious meal
For us two tired wanderers.

We're left over from the '60s
Living in the past but in the moment
Listening to Mama Tried (well, she did!)
And crying over Wharf Rat
We model turtles, Celtic knots, a moose
Dream of yesterday and tomorrow
Say what we mean
Take a misguided turn driving home
And our minds meander to slumber and internal illusions.

You hold the short balsa match
Between your stubby pale fingers
The bitten-down nails painted black-cherry-hot-blood red.
And you tremble.

Strike it- sulfur's tangy odor permeates the air.

Your soul rattles like dead leaves
On the end of a long blight-stricken oak branch in November.

Skin, it hisses like firewood left out in the rain
And reddens like your cheeks did when your lips first touched his,
When you first saw his skin gleaming white
In the Autumn-chill  moonglow.

Now it blisters, white and swollen, tender, sore.
And you feel you've accomplished something, moved forward,
But there's a faint voice
Calling to you from the back of your consciousness
Telling you you've gone down the wrong road entirely.

You'll be wearing an old grey pea-coat,
Buttoned tighter than my grip on the wheel
On my way over,
My hands trembling
Like something small, trapped, scared-
As I was speeding off toward freedom, security.

Your scarf will keep your neck and chin
Protected from the damp cold night the color of slate.
And there'll be Johnny Cash playing:
And in the dim of yesterday
I can clearly see
That flesh and blood cried out to someone
As it does in me
And I'll take my place against the rail.

You'll sidle over to where I stand
But you won't stand too close.
You'll smell like moss and musk and sandalwood
And slowly you'll slide closer
A deliberate, serpentine motion.

Now.

Our hips touch.
You go red and my hands tingle
As your fingers glide into their place between mine,
Warp and weft.
I'd risk it all right now.