Today,
John took off his sunglasses
But left on his hat,
As he smiled at the lady behind the
Counter at the motel.
She had a beehive hair-do, he noticed,
Two feet tall and yellow,
But he didn’t say anything.
She smiled back, slid a key to him,
Told him, “Room 303”.

Yesterday,
John put on his sunglasses,
And stopped at the screen door,
Reaching up for his hat.
It was sunny yet windy,
And he planned to be rebellious.
Windows down, top speed,
No destination,
He drove.

In 1987,
John met a lady named Clara,
And fell in love with the way
She served him coffee and pecan pie
In that old greasy spoon,
Built inside an old railroad car,
Which sat beside the river’s shore
Out on Interstate 24.
She had a yellow beehive
That was twenty years out of time,
And she could have been out of her mind,
But she knew how to smile,
To drive a lonely man wild-
But how she refilled his coffee for free,
Without a doubt, was his favorite part-
She seemed to just dive right through
The hotness and steam, straight into his heart.

In 1991,
John and Clara got married.
She had one of those tiny, white,
Lace-covered cowboy hats that matched her dress.
It clung to her climbing hair, and
Tiny leaves and babies’ breath were everywhere.
Why those hats were ever in style, he never knew,
But he said nothing, because
Her sister wore one too.
They smiled for the pictures,
She held up her heavy dress.
They held hands and waved,
Before climbing into
John’s beat-up Cabriolet-
In love, driving away.

Now it’s
Eighteen years,
Eighteen excuses
To try to hang onto the past.
John liked to close his eyes sometimes, and
Picture her: pink apron,
Arms loaded with plates of food.
Meatloaf, mashed potatoes,
Every kind of bean:
Red, black, pinto, kidney and green;
Number one was the free coffee,
Or was that reason eighteen?

Yesterday,
John put on his sunglasses,
And stopped at the screen door,
Reaching up for his hat.
It was sunny yet windy,
And he planned to be rebellious.
Windows down, top speed,
No destination,
He drove.
He drove until he passed
The sister’s house in which
His Clara now lived,
The cowboy hats, like their love,
Forgotten and gone.
In a different town in a different world,
He drove into a tiny motel parking lot,
Not paying attention to
Whether he was okay with
Moving on or not.

Today,
John took off his sunglasses
But left on his hat,
As he smiled at the lady behind the
Counter at the motel.
She had a beehive hair-do, he noticed,
Two feet tall and yellow,
But he didn’t say anything.
She smiled back, slid a key to him,
Told him, “Room 303”.
But before he went,
Ready for rest, dying to sleep,
Perchance to dream
Of anything but what happened to
Half his life in Chattanooga, Tennessee…
He took in her friendly eyes,
Mysterious style,
Warm smile.
And John couldn’t help it,
He felt delighted when she said:
“The coffee in the morning
Costs a dollar-forty-three.
But I like your sunglasses,
And you seem alright by me…
So I may just pour you a cup for free.”

i would have agreed to ernest hemingway when he said that one should never go on trips with anyone one does not love, but i said otherwise starting that moment i met you. if you do not love me at the time that we've decided to go on a trip together, then lay on your back, watch me drive and drive you crazy. i'd be your chauffeur, since i am a professional driver i'd keep in mind how safe you should be with me, through the longest ride of your life i'd try hard enough to bring you delight as i fold down the roof of our cabriolet. the cold breezy wind would hit your smooth face, thus windy it would make your hair sway along with it. i'll let you feel macrocosm and hope that you'd know that my love for you is nature-like, we'd grow, then find peace with each other and if destructions hit us, we will heal afterwards we'd find our way back to each other's arm.

i am the one to maneuver the ship we'll use on our sojourn in this fantasy, with high hopes that someday we'd have our longest voyage but we are together evermore. i'd like to be your high-grade licensed mariner until our ship ends sail; but as we embark on this new journey, pardon me for i will wish upon all the heavenly bodies above us. i'd whisper to them if that's what i have to do just to make you love me. i am not certain if you'd swing your body along with the wave of the open sea, so i as your captain, i'd move you back and forth, to oscillate you like a pendulum enjoying the moment. and so, i'll dance with you until my sea-like love for you, be reciprocated with your ocean-like one.

but if us will never happen, tell me. on our way, i am fully aware that we will encounter an iceberg that may cause our ship to sink, or a limestone rock that would cause us to trip–make us stumble and fall on our knees. when our trip ends, that is the time we can say if you love me or you still don't. for a moment, i'll kiss you passionately if you would let me. and i'll drive you back home, so you could finally rest after our tiresome travel. maybe, it came too foolish to travel with someone you don't love, but isn't it where all of it starts? isn't there this need to explore just to find out? if you change your mind, call me. when you find out that you already love me, hit me up. we'll fuel this love, until our end and until the day all the machines be disconnected from our bodies. because my love for you is endless, and my heart hopes that this journey of lifetime would make you love me as well.

short story  i wrote in 11/1/2014*

Decomposing sewer rat- that's the smell that will always remind me of her.
A tow colored ponytail, pulled back tautly with the smallish bobby pins holding down her page bangs, would greet me every time I walked into the cafeteria at lunch. She was a new kid, a sophmore, and I didn't know her name. She sat alone by the big red painted double doors. Everyone in the school wanted to get out-  but she seemed to always be smiling. It was my second semester of senior year, after winter break, after weeks of seeing the same girl sitting alone and never seeing her hair down that I decided to finally sit down next to her. The way she ignored my varsity jacket was striking- though it was my older brother's, the football team's logo always seemed to impress new girls who didn't know any better. She just kept on eating her yogurt. And then she looked to her right. And she kept on smiling. 'Hello, and your name is...?'
'Mike,' I offered my hand. And you? She just said her name was J.
I took it but wasn't satisfied. She went on to tell me she was new, from Burlington, Vermont- that she hated Scarsdale. And the bell rung. I went home that night endlessly calculating what the J could've stood for- Jennifer? Jessica? June? Jessica had me by the heels and she held me upside down. It took me days and days and finally a week and finally even a month to convince June that we should see each other outside of school. And then it took me that night taking out the trash to find out that Jennifer lived three doors away from me in a huge limestone manor. Then it took me the next day to convince her that- hey- tomorrow is a Friday, why not do something?
June said yes, put her sweater sleeve to her hand. I read once in a European studies textbook that in Elizabethan playhouses, they would sell orange rinds in little tea bags for people to hold up to their noses- the smell of all the people who didn't know about washing was so nauseating. It was ten pm when she called me that night and told me her parents would be in the Catskills and she hadn't seen my parent's cars in our driveway- so why not go to the city?
I took it in careful consideration that lasted approximately 5 seconds. I said yes si and da in every language possible. Something told me to go with her. I thought of the way she always smiled whether it was wide or wan and I could hardly wait for Friday night at 10pm.
The next day we drove to the city in her Audi cabriolet. I played New Order- but we didn't get to the city in the time we expected. The woods seemed to go on to the tune of the Perfect Kiss.
But by Face Up, we were in the city. We'd parallel parked in front of some bar  and made our way around. Then halfway through the sidewalk she asked. "Can we ride the subway?" I nodded. I supposed a Vermont girl had never seen New York City anyways. We took the R train at Rector until the end of the line. Then we went home. After that day, She went home after she dropped me off. I didn't find out what J meant or was and then it took three days to see that Jessica's house was actually just a forest. There was no limestone. It felt real, the riding the R train and the music in our ears  and even the yogurt she had eaten. But it took the next morning to monday to see there had never been a girl named J and the table was empty. It hadn't been a dream but I had to wonder if it was even real. But the other day I was on my way to Lexington  and I had sworn to god i'd seen her on the rails- on the rails! I cried for help but everyone just stared. Then I grabbed my briefcase and decided to go home instead of work for the day.

I lift my EYES
to appear not to leer at her chest
the trunk which she carries her valuables
is beaten and tattered

I double take with my EYES
and lock on her rear end
As fins on the old Cadillac
flair like none other ever made.

My wandering EYES
are fixed on her ******* frame
the cabriolet  matches
her pristine interior to a T.

Serendipity sounds as though

It might be a state of empathy

and ‘Karma' Ghia is a cabriolet,

that’s how we'll go looking for it.