Flying Observations

Flying Observations

1.

Sometimes I dream I’m flying through the air, pretending I’m a bird when I’m actually swimming underwater in the pool at our apartment complex in Tampa.  Fearlessly, I travel towards the deep end where there are less and less people.  I am invisible to a world of bathing beauties, who lace the outside of the pool, absorbing hours of rays onto their skin.  I touch the bottom of the pool with my hand.  I feel sand. 

2.

When I fly in my dreams, like I do in the pool, I perch on top of the long sweeping branches of the old maple trees of Michigan, weeping willows of Minnesota, and the palms of Florida; these are the trees of my past and present. I am alone in my observations.

3.

I don’t have the words yet to describe what I’m seeing. 

4.

Like in my dreams, I take big underwater strides, gracefully jumping in slow motion from treetop to treetop—disappearing into the blue before me.

She Thinks of You While Cooking

She Thinks of You While Cooking

It’s the crescent of the body,

a relief, the way to yield

across the kitchen table,

the way body becomes

vulnerable, soft indentions into wood.

With our reflexes, we become tasteless

in all our desires in the wait;

she finds you in the fragrance,

and creates a marriage—

the lemon, oil, and the pepper.

This is the nature of all fruit,

The offering, the submission of their only flowers,

an exotic display, a culinary play

narrated daily by the heavens.