My quantum coffee cup
Is dry, barren like
My soul this Sunday morning
I looked picturesque
sliding the styrofoam
down the asphalt drive
I figured it was over –
Before I got too deep in
Better that I kept a boy,
Not a dream,
By my side
Ears open to the preacher
He called me a nonbeliever
People who won’t find Jesus
Since they never try
Salvation’s for those searching it
But leaving cold pews behind
I felt no need to go
Café-searching after you
You were there, though
I thought nothing of it, stubborn
I’ll claim the winter’s melted
And the springtime’s now abloom
Love doesn't need me –
What could it do but burn
my tongue on fantasies?
Polite, we idle chat in lazy garden air
Sipping fruits of earth
Watching daylilies and children
You in your slimming figure
I in plaid and baseball caps
We’re left useless –
Our passion evaporated
Gone
“I can climb this church.”
In thirty second and whimsical note,
I take two sugar pills
And the next thing I know
Is that you’re standing by a steeple
Wind whipping my heart strings
And I realize you aren’t flavor set
Because here we are –
Whispering telemarketers
Over all your symphonies
Intellectual, a touch of spice
A cider, a sweet first wine
First love, a sweep from my feet
And I gaze at you, a wine glass
Stemmed and glinting in noonday light
As you whisper in front of God’s house,
White walls in raring stare
“I will marry you one day.”
My breath is gone
And parsley’s on my Spanish tongue
(and my commitment to him)
So we can finally dine on him tonight
We’ll toast you with a sloshing passion
A bet-it-all that you won’t hit the floor
We’ll illusion this afternoon
Though we’re still below the drinking age
This weakened sweet-tooth must surrender
To the winds above the chapel
To the white chocolate piano stairs,
To the river music quiet
Just one sip of you
And I’m drunk…
14 naïve years old
