nashville, 1971

with a dozen roses from tyler, texas...

stems pressed between my elbow and my side,

blossoms jutting out beneath my shoulder

like a burst of blood frozen by the camera

in a cheap and violent movie...

i lope easily across the rain-engorged alley

my dingoes squishing shamelessly in the mud

erupting small splashes of sound

into the early sunday morning silence

then, from the alley, i ascend a gentle rise

to the glass slick, rain-washed lawn

of a tall, rambling three story house

turned gray with vampire winter’s wind

sucking life from ancient white-washed walls

now the leather of my boots squeaks on splintered stairs

a sneaky, sheepish sound

my run ended, i am suddenly slowed

not ready yet to announce my arrival

i carefully climb the wooden backless steps

uneasily attached to the rear of the house

to the first landing and the single eye

of the back door window whose lacy curtains are half-closed

as if what lay beyond were feigning sleep

and watching me greedily behind an eyelash thin wall

now, shuffling the mud from my boots

onto the frilly fibers of her doormat,

i feel a massive, incredible wave of adolescent shyness

sweep past my adult sophistications

and drown my will beneath a flood of indecision

i hold the roses before me in one hand

an ineffectual barrier, fooling no one,

my free hand stretches out, one finger trembles

the trembling translates into a noisy, stacatto buzzing

of her un-feminine, unnerving doorbell

i stand, back to a gray and ugly sky,

facing a door in a wall of gray and lifeless wood

and feeling just as gray from the inside of my ash dry mouth

to the paleness of my nearly fainting face

with a ridiculous, incongruous bouquet

of obscenely red roses

mocking all the gray and coldness

in the air, in the wood....in me

and the door opens

moving on mysteriously silent hinges

in a world where such things nearly always creak and rasp

and a gasp of air envelopes me

like the breath of a child escaping all at once

astonished by the splendor of the tree on christmas morning

warm and tingly, vibrating with a thousand whispers and promises

laced with the twin smells of baking bread

from an oven somewhere nearby

and a perfume that strikes with

a pungent, serpentine sensuality

transforming the yeasty image of bread rising

into a throat catching, erotic flash of twin breasts rising,

pale and flour-ery from a shocking, silky slip of negligee

my eyes skid past her

careening off walls and floor and assorted pieces of

salvation army furniture and mirrors and stained glass, tiffany lamps

till, braking and boomeranging, i force my focus to her face

my elbow creaks, arthritic and threatening to pop loudly

as my automatic arm thrusts the roses forward

unnecessarily close to her pert nose

i stand in the space between the seconds ticking by

and my hand begins to vibrate with a low hum

i stare into her solemn, searching eyes

and know that if she does not smile soon

my whole arm will be palsied with

a violent, uncontrollable spasm

and i’ll scatter a cascade of rose petals at her feet

and turn and leap down the stairs

in a complete and utterly defeated rout

and run back across her yard

through the mud of the alley to my hollow room

and in the instant when it seems the fabric

of time itself must surely rip from the strain

a faint, butterfly-shadow of a smile

passes over her serious, until now unapproachable, face

the roses bunched lightly to her breast

she turns slightly

and, with the delicate motion

of a fragile fingered

impossibly feminine hand,

she invites me in