Friday, November 28, 2014

Dinner with the only Greek Puritan

Dear, dear boy: 
Come on over. 
Sit down. 
Have a drink?
12 years aged, 
It’s not the only icy beast 
In this warm, warm room. 

Here, I like silk ties; 
You’re wearing a sweater, 
Your jacket is leather, 
The clothes aren’t striped, 
But your forehead is furrowed. 

It’s my mistake, 
Really—

I made you up more than I listened. 
A man’s locution in a boy’s voice, 
Bellbottoms hugged your fecund thighs. 
How was I to know that I 
would be nervous?
That it would not be me, sitting there? 
No, no, not I, but the meager
shadow 
(of lucky, lucky me)
across the table from you?
Tomorrow's headlines won't read:
"Anxious artist meets her creation.”


It’s a wonder, but
despite it all, 
I'm almost head-over-heels.
That--
Or I’m just dizzy from all the walking.

With you, I will: loiter and amble--
greengrass-over-hill. 
But only 
If you bring:
The polka-dotted scarf, 
The bauble-lipped snicker, 
Your eyes’ lascivious glimmer--  
Indeed, my faith did flicker:
Be true- was this our very own last supper?

Are you the apostle holding the knife?
And am I rich with unspent coin?
Or was it never supper at all:
Did we merely consume a most ordinary dinner,
Of strange sustenance that only made us thinner?
(Were you also cursed with fanciful expectations?)


Really— 
Who could ever know? 

I, for one, never knew-
To me, you
were (presently, or perhaps never?)
The ironic fertilizer of my fields:
A hardworking mule, my favorite muse--
Always busy, inciting all the words.
Good! In fair exchange,
I offer you-
Reap my succulence, this sweet fruit:
My (catalyzed) literacy. 

To be sure, it inevitably is
the way of men and Gods:
To come and go.
The fairer ones:
We linger and kiss,
Virtuous, just, until--
The only dilemma is posed.

Alas! 
You are not an easy problem to solve.
But really—
Who could ever have known?

My good sir, please tell me:
Where is Aphrodite when you need her?
Oh! 
We both know:
I am no king of Cyprus.
But be my Galatea and bear me Paphos?
(Secretly, I’ll admit I’m concerned more with the process
than creation.)
Jesus!
Let me not fawn over a deafeningly silent rock!
I console, love with my soul, I understand,
(Lesser, I am consoled, loved and understood.) 
But you’re the oddest oddity, and--
I have quite the collection.

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