An amber moon painted against a silken sky in hues of blue
She sighs out of relief as her maiden steps out into the light
The southerly wind bides it’s time, knowing just where to find her

The same place I find her. The maiden. Between a thought and a dream.
The steam from a cup of tea floats up like a specter
And reminds me of her.
How it is she moves.
Between a thought and a dream.

The maiden looks upon the moon and smiles.
As if acknowledging an old friend.
She rests herself in the grace of its light and embraces it without gesture.
Just in spirit.
They have a mutual understanding of what it means to be alone.

A book lies before me on the small table in front of the tea shop.
Odysseus and Penelope.
I wonder if she’s read it.
Or would she let me read it to her.

She takes three flowers from her garden and nods to the moon.
Before retreating back into her home.
Across the street from where I sit.
Every Friday night.
At the No. 13 Tea Shop.

My days and nights fold over one another, going unnoticed.
I do not suffer any day save Friday. Wherein I’ll find her again.
Across the street from the No. 13 Tea Shop.
Right about the time my tea is placed before me by a man with seemingly no tongue.
Because he never speaks to me.

I’ve watched Odysseus slay the cyclops a hundred times.
From my chair, before the ghosts that spring from my tea.
And again she steps outside her home. Rinsing off the day in the light of the moon.

I’d longed to approach her. To tell her of the feelings that stir within.
Just at the sight of her.
To tell her a joke so that I may hear that laugh of hers.
I’d heard it once before.
While she watched the stars play amongst the grass in the park.
Where I first saw her.

Since then. A hundred cups of tea later. I sat here still.
As if I were watching a doe in the wood.
Hesitant to move to suddenly.
For fear that she’d somehow escape my dream.

Finally I’d decided that I’d haunt her no more.
That I’d cease my foolish endeavors in trying to muster the courage to speak to her.
I begrudgingly withdrew myself from my favorite chair.
Heeding the chance to see her one last time. To bless my soul with the knowledge that she still exist.
I’d resign her to being just a dream.

For how would I approach her in anyway.
To tell her that she is ether for my heart.
Alas, I should let this lion of a moment sleep.
To stir it couldn’t possibly bode well for I or my heart.
Someone as wondrous as her has only to be visiting. For I do not see how heaven could function without her.

I approached the shop keeper to settle my tab. He silently refused my payment for the tea.
I insisted that the tea be paid for.
His smile, seemingly etched onto his face only grew.
“Your tea has been paid for, as has every tea of yours for the next month.”
“You owe me nought, why would you do this?” I replied.
“I didn’t.”
He smiled once more at my confused expression.
Then he looked past me and motioned behind me.
There she stood. At the top of her steps.
“Seems someone has decided they don’t want you to go.” He said.

Just by coincidence.
On the day I’d finally decided that my courage had failed me.
She lifted my weary soul.
In front of the No. 13 tea shop.