wade slowly

He pours himself into the high-backed barstool, eyes maintaining steady contact with the bartender. A nod is his acknowledgement, and a smile of assent to the the usual. the radio, more static than coherent sound, is giving a just bearable rendition of Lauryn Hill. Elbows resting on the bar, he palms and supports his head on left and right sides. 

it has been a long day

Poetry to make you go "hmmm"...

Little Beast

By Richard Siken

1


An all-night barbeque. A dance on the courthouse lawn.

The radio aches a little tune that tells the story of what the night

is thinking. It’s thinking of love.

It’s thinking of stabbing us to death

and leaving our bodies in a dumpster.

That’s a nice touch, stains in the night, whiskey and kisses for everyone.


Tonight, by the freeway, a man eating fruit pie with a buckknife

carves the likeness of his lover’s face into the motel wall. I like him

and I want to be like him, my hands no longer an afterthought.


2


Someone once told me that explaining is an admission of failure.

I’m sure you remember, I was on the phone with you, sweetheart.


3


History repeats itself. Somebody says this.

History throws its shadow over the beginning, over the desktop,

over the sock drawer with its socks, its hidden letters.

History is a little man in a brown suit

trying to define a room he is outside of.

I know history. There are many names in history

but none of them are ours.


4


He had green eyes,

so I wanted to sleep with him—

green eyes flecked with yellow, dried leaves on the surface of a pool-

You could drown in those eyes, I said.

The fact of his pulse,

the way he pulled his body in, out of shyness or shame or a desire

not to disturb the air around him.

Everyone could see the way his muscles worked,

the way we look like animals,

his skin barely keeping him inside.

I wanted to take him home

and rough him up and get my hands inside him, drive my body into his

like a crash test car.

I wanted to be wanted and he was

very beautiful, kissed with his eyes closed, and only felt good while moving.

You could drown in those eyes, I said,

so it’s summer, so it’s suicide,

so we’re helpless in sleep and struggling at the bottom of the pool.


5


It wasn’t until we were well past the middle of it

that we realized

the old dull pain, whose stitched wrists and clammy fingers,

far from being subverted,

had only slipped underneath us, freshly scrubbed.

Mirrors and shop windows returned our faces to us,

replete with the tight lips and the eyes that remained eyes

and not the doorways we had hoped for.

His wounds healed, the skin a bit thicker than before,

scars like train tracks on his arms and on his body underneath his shirt.


6


We still groped for each other on the backstairs or in parked cars

as the roads around us

grew glossy with ice and our breath softened the view through a glass

already laced with frost,

but more frequently I was finding myself sleepless, and he was running out

of lullabies.

But damn if there isn’t anything sexier

than a slender boy with a handgun,

a fast car, a bottle of pills.


7


What would you like? I’d like my money’s worth.

Try explaining a life bundled with episodes of this—

swallowing mud, swallowing glass, the smell of blood

on the first four knuckles.

We pull our boots on with both hands

but we can’t punch ourselves awake and all I can do

is stand on the curb and say Sorry

about the blood in your mouth. I wish it was mine.




I couldn’t get the boy to kill me, but I wore his jacket for the longest time.

Short Story - Song For A Sacrifice (An Inner City Narrative)

Darren hustled quickly, his long strides echoing in the pre-dawn stillness.  It had been a gratifying night out with his friends, and though high on the release at attending the very rare indulgence of a party, he was acutely aware of what it would mean to be discovered out of bed come sunrise. 
He gingerly entered the old colonial era boarding house, a single storey clapboard structure with just enough concrete to make it habitable, crowned with a rusty prism of corrugated sheet zinc. Praying that the old wooden floor did not betray his return, he took tiptoeing skips down the corridor to the rooms he and Mama shared. He pressed first ear, then eyes to the keyhole before opening the door, ever so slowly lifting as he pushed to lessen the creak and twang of the old hinges. A particularly loud squeak just as the space was large enough to slide in made turned his blood to ice. For several heartbeats he held his position, not daring to look around. With a dull rushing exhale, convinced that he was undiscovered, he entered and swung the door to within an inch of closing, at last moment stilling the momentum as he carefully joined the jamb and door into their fitted seam and engaged the lock. 
"Darren, why you won't leave them loose gal and stop the bad living?  You don't think I getting tired of worrying ‘bout you?" the lamp by the couch, his bed of sorts, flicked on to reveal the comfortably appointed living room; casting shadows on the walls where his books, stacked on the dining table. The slight movement of recoil from the light brought his gaze to his mother, nightgown clad with a forbidding scowl. Crap.
"Mama, me’s a man now enuh, and is not like me a shame you, me don't disrespect you, go a church wit' you, all dem tings, and still you act like man cyaa go enjoy dem self?”
He hoped futilely that she would be derailed. Behind her large round bifocals, he saw her eyes and nose flare, then impossibly narrow. Why did he respond? He kicked himself mentally: he knew better than this. Stifling the sigh that was almost reflexive, he looked just left of her face, seeming to meet her gaze while really focused on a point just beyond her right shoulder. After a lengthy standoff, Darren’s defensive stance relaxed as she shrugged and lifted herself out of her perch. With a sigh and slow stretch she moved through the open door to his left that entered her bedroom. 
Having shucked off his shoes, Darren threw himself into the couch. Burying his head into the overstuffed armrest that was his pillow, he closed eyes dry and scratchy from exhaustion.
~*~*~*
“Oye fish, beg you move from mi gate deh!” 
A greeting and admonition shouted at some distance away, from within the sweaty ranks of the men ambling down the street. A facial tic was all that indicated that he heard the jibe, and Pancho continued his conversation with Marie, not missing a beat. Her demeanour however had changed, muscles in her neck and shoulders coiling. 
The group stopped several paces from the duo, and the speaker emerged, closing the distance with a self-confident bandy legged swagger. He planted a kiss on Marie’s neck before playfully rubbing a sweat soaked arm down the front of her blouse. She shrugged him off with an exaggerated grunt of disgust, to the catcalls of his mates who had resumed their progress. Laughing it off, he turned to Pancho and good-naturedly, if not too warmly, inclined his head in greeting.
“Evening Omar,” Pancho responded with an answering nod. “Marie, me going to go find my yard, tek care and layta.” With a wave of his long elegant fingers, he was off in a hip swinging strut up the street. 
Omar curled his arm around Marie’s ample waist, and led her back into their tenement from behind, he inhaling the scent of her shampooed auburn hair; she glorying in his musk.
~*~*~*
“Darren! Di rug dem want to wash, and you said you doing dem today. Come while the sun can dry dem!” There was a good deal of pleasure elicited by his pained groan of a response. She had only allowed him three hours of rest. He shed his shirt and jeans, and went to the clothes barrel behind her door to retrieve and shrug into oversized basketball shorts and a slim vest. 
Barefooted, Darren walked into their dustbowl of a yard, rolled area rug hoisted on his shoulder. As he walked along the front fence, he heard the musical jangle of bracelets, and turned in time to see Pancho round the corner in full ‘gumption gait’ as Darren called it. A soft chuckle escaped at the thought, derailing the progress of the passing musing’s subject. Turning to the fence, Pancho’s plastered smile became a sneer. 
“Morning Darren. What you find so funny in dis sun hot?” Darren looked up and then immediately away.
“Morning. I was just remembering something. Sorry.” He hung his head, wanting to retreat to the house, the backyard, to anywhere. He remained rooted to the spot, and berated himself for uttering the apology, to him an admission of guilt. 
Pancho peered down at the embarrassed youth from his considerable height. He was not a hard sight to get lost in: short and stocky, his muscular arms roped with pulsing veins, and a wide torso that tapered to a narrow waist; all supported by legs and calves of defined, almost hairless black marble. He loosed a feral smile, before schooling his face into a more pleasant expression. 
“Look up man, you’s big man now, no reason to hang head, and no reason to feel no way for that.” 
Slowly Darren lifted his head, to meet his scrutiny, taken aback by the warmth of the response and of the smile he saw.
“Darren, di rug not going get clean resting on your shoulder boy!” Mama’s voice sounded from the veranda a few steps away. Self-consciously, Darren jumped back and turned to her, to find her narrowed eyes which were trained on Pancho. 
“Morning Miss G!” Pancho hailed in a modulated, sweet falsetto. He saw her barely repressed recoil as she greeted him coolly with a wave, before retreating into the corridor. It stung, but ever quick to recover from such daily exchanges, Pancho rounded back on Darren. 
“Go do what you Mama say sir; soon midday.” And with a chiming wave of bangled  wrist he sauntered away, easing back into his power stride. 
Mama observed from the cover of her vantage point as her son watched Pancho leave, surprised to look at his face and see…longing? No, it must be the heat, and blinking she looked and saw the grit teeth scowl that was his work face, and shoved the silly notion of there being any other expression. 
Darren mercilessly whacked the area rug, each muffled “thwack” of the beater sending grey dust eddying in little whirlwinds. He was covered in it and inhaling ragged breaths through his mouth when his mother came silently around the house with the hose and bucket. She passed between him and the suspended rug, and placed them on the small square of asphalted ground where the scrubbing would take place, then just as silently returned to the front. 
She had begun to feel the niggling of guilt as she saw him haul the almost threadbare piece of flooring to the ground and, hose screwed and pipe on, began to soak it for lathering. I should have let him sleep in, she thought to herself, wishing she had the courage to apologise for insistently treating him like an errant child. As she squinted at the sun baked grimace of a boy wresting with manual labour, she lovingly noted how the line of his jaw and set of his forehead reminded her so much of his father. With a heavy sigh, she returned to the kitchen.
“It is completely unfair that he should be so free, so, so…so damn comfortable!” Darren fumed as he scrubbed at a gravy stain, venting in an intense whisper. 
Several minutes later, grudgingly succumbing to fatigue and hunger he headed for the shade of the large Ackee tree in the centre of the yard. The only respite in the hot, dusty and pebble filled space, the tree was the hub of all outdoor activity. He settled onto a cardboard topped juice crate, tilting a mason jar of ice cold water to his lips and enjoying its unimpeded flow down his throat as he guzzled. Nicholas, the seven year old son of the family who shared their tenement stared at him, transfixed. It was a gaze brimming with the stark innocence of youth, and Darren, discovering his audience, found himself very unnerved at being its recipient.
“What you want Nick? Where you mummy?” 
The little boy grinned warmly, shook his head vigorously and ran off to another quadrant of the yard. Behind and some distance off, Marisa, the child’s mother had watched the exchange, a slow smile playing across her features. Her gaze lingered on the bits of Darren’s torso unprotected by the cotton vest, a tingling heat uncoiling at her core.

~*~*~*
“Are you sure about this?”
“It is the last party for the year Darren, don’t be a punk.” Omario said, admiring his handiwork over his canvas’ shoulder as he turned him to face his full length reflection. 
“Yea…but… these are so…close.” 
Darren gestured to the close fitting pants and sleeveless bejewelled pullover that currently left no part of his body’s contour to the imagination. He watched his friend’s reflection roll its eyes dismissively as he turned to retrieve some other complimentary article to the ensemble.
“Darren, you are a single sweet and considerate guy, who severely needs to get out there!” A dramatic flourish of purple as he brandished a cable knit cardigan. He rejected the piece and it joined the growing heap on the left of the wardrobe. 
“I don’t know about all that, but I’m a content hermit. Do I have to come?” 
Darren’s plea had been met with no response. 
“Aha!” was the victory cry as Omario emerged from his task clutching a white shirt that looked made of Lycra and accented with stainless steel detailing and zippers.
In companionable and anticipatory silence they got into the waiting cab and, directions given, waited while ferried to Sunkist Planet: Apocalypse; the final event of the alternate lifestyle calendar. 
As they disembarked at the dimly lit and well decorated venue, Darren became rigid with tension. Barely tamping down the urge to panic and flee, he resumed breathing when Omario squeezed his bicep reassuringly and offered a calming smile. Meeting and holding his gaze, Darren supplied his own shy mimicry of one. They presented their tickets and entered. 
Darren was completely floored by the vista laid before him: couples of various assortments danced erotically; groping and gyrating in time to the steady thump of a playlist of bass driven mindless pop love-anthems. His eyes adjusted, he watched as others mingled, ate, drank, or holed up in dark spots passionately devouring each other. He was led to the bar, and after being presented briefly to the host, was plied with three shots of an almost phosphorescent green drink, which went down smoothly to settle as a tantalizing burn in the pit of his stomach. 
“I’m going to go find the other guys D, you stay by here.” He nodded in agreement as Omario sashayed into the growing melee, hips swaying in his rhythmic confident gait. 
“Darren? Wait deh…Darren?!”
 An ominous clang of bangles and bracelets made him very slowly turn to face the source of the voice, and locating it, was rooted in position. Lithe arms flailing excitedly, Pancho made his way over to where Darren stood by the bar counter, towing – to his added horror – Marisa, who, on seeing him, shifted expression from giggling humour to a mask of absolute shock, then revulsion (or was that hurt? he briefly amended). 
“Wow man Darren, if I did know…why you never say nutten boy?! Marisa, you did know?” oblivious to either party’s discomfiture Pancho ploughed on good naturedly, ordering drinks for himself and Marisa, who snapped up in time to refuse the offer and, claiming claustrophobia, retreated to just outside the venue.
“I still cyaa believe though Darren – a how long since you deh ‘bout?” Pancho, in typical animated fashion did a sweeping wave over all Darren’s features. 
“I have always been gay Pancho, I also have always valued my privacy. I feel I have made a terrible mistake in coming here. I am very sorry.” Ever courteous, Darren excused himself, slowly being loosed of his sensibility as a walk became a shoving brisk march. 
He felt the walls closing in; the artfully draped cloths menacing serpentine restrains coiling around his limbs and crushing his neck. Free of the enclosure, he broke into a flat out sprint, ignorant of and uncaring for the concerned glances that followed his pell-mell scurry down the steep mountain road. 
He frenetically hailed the first bus that came, and jumping in, sat in the darkest corner of the vehicle. As they pulled away, his breaths slowed, and the drop in adrenaline reawakened him to his current state of dress. His clothes were still at Omario’s apartment. With great effort he managed to avoid panicking, and remembered his laundry, which should still be hanging and somewhat dry on the clotheslines in the backyard. Hopping off the still moving coaster, he stealthily made his way down his street, staying mostly in shadow.
 Making it to his gate unnoticed, he bolted around the house and quickly donned a pair of his loosest denim shorts, hastily trading the top for a white slim vest. Calmed by the act, he retrieved a hamper from the shadowed foot of the Ackee tree and removed the rest of his laundry, folding them and filling the container. Aroused by the rustling in the yard, Miss G shifted her room curtain, surprised to see Darren diligently folding as he unpinned the pieces off the line. 
He really is a good boy, she mused, before settling back into bed. 
An hour later, awash in cold sweat and with no more reason to defer entering, Darren made his way down the corridor and opened his door, hamper resting on a hip. He gingerly engaged the lock, and fell hard onto the couch, where almost immediately he fell into deep troubled sleep. 
Waking a little past sunrise, tense and awash in sweat, Darren rose with an urge more pressing than usual to empty his bladder. Not wanting to pass through his mother’s room to the toilet, he made his way instead outside, to find some corner or fence post to relieve himself. As a steady streamed poured from him, his head snapped around at the sound of fast approaching footfalls. It was Nicholas, running toward him, a beatific, unnerving expression on his sweat shined face. Without slowing he ran right into Darren’s thigh, gripping it with arms and legs, narrowly avoiding the still spouting stream. 
“Get down Nick, go back inside. Where you mummy?!” Darren stamped the imprisoned leg, to the gleeful shouts of an entertained Nicholas, delighted at the discovery of this new game. Darren’s pleas to be left alone and attempts to remove his fiercely clinging assaulter all met with failure as Nicholas hung on for all he was worth. 
Hearing the subdued rustling of activity just outside her window, Marisa started awake, and felt the cool spot on the bed where her son usually lay. She moved her curtain aside to investigate the source of the disturbance and shot out of bed, unhinged. 
“Leave him alone, nasty pervert, move fish and leave mi son alone!” 
She descended upon the pair, and began to frantically pull at her child, eventually prising him from Darren’s leg to hold him tightly to her torso. 
Finally relieved of his captor, it took a moment for the shouted words and the expression on Marisa’s face to truly permeate his thoughts… and to realise that persons, hearing the din had slowly emerged from their homes or peered through windows at the scene. Incredulity turned to panic when, as he faced her to rebut her accusations, he felt the cold sweep of air on the wet skin of his groin. In his preoccupation with the tussle he could not really have…forgot? His face drained of all blood at the full extent of what the scenario presented. He only had seconds before one shout then another erupted, and then the clang of missiles being launched spurred him to flight, speech deserting him, and indeed purposeless at this point. 
Babbling incoherently, zipper still undone, Darren sprinted past a bewildered Pancho, who staggered slowly up the street. The mob rounded the corner just as he was about to call to the fleeing man, and he stood rooted as the throng advanced on and then past him, parting and reassembling as they chased their quarry. Bringing up the rear was a livid Marisa, son in hand, his face set in wide eyed terror. 
“Pancho, Hold Nicky for me, carry him to Marie and Omar tell them fi keep him, mi jus’ catch Darren a – him –“ 
Breathless with rage and exertion, she gave up all attempts to continue, shoved Nicholas into his arms and, lifting the skirts of her dusty nightgown jogged to catch the ranks of the mob. Pancho stood transfixed as the unit gained slowly on the lad. 
Shock abating, Nicholas leaned into Pancho’s neck and his breathing settled. The boy had been exhausted by the ordeal and was falling asleep in his arms. Pancho opened the metal gate to Marie and Omar’s tenement, an unsettling dread forming a knot in his stomach.  

 - Carl- Anthony Hines

I Saw Her Break...

I saw her break...
In the light of dying day
from desperate hope
dashed to a slow burn of despair
how will she cope?

I saw her break...
as the lights dimmed
her eyes red rimmed
from her compulsive rubbing
dry rivulets she forced not to swell

I saw her break...
as I itemised, stacked
made real her isolation
as I swallowed the bile
salting my own March to damnation

I saw her break...
as the room became the cell
cold and austere, her haven a hell
and for a moment I felt it
I acknowledged my fractures...

I saw her break...
and I lost my indignation
lost all reason for upset
I...lost, and yet never knew
that there was reason for "winning"

I saw break...
as the minutes ticked by
a lonely little girl who never dreamed
she could feel so alone...
and I broke with her
...as did the seemingly shatterproof universe that ensconced us...

To The Girl-turned-Woman who moved me...

You are beautiful, whole and perfect; the universe's gift to all who are blessed to come into contact with you.

I have wanted to offer my two cents, but feel it would be an insignificant contribution to the outpouring, and so I stand with them, willing my sentiment to permeate the air and that you will know that I support and am awed by you. these four years I have had the distinct honour of being acquainted with you have truly been some of the most noteworthy of my life. As I stood by you that night, I began to muse on just how far our interactions have evolved.. I remember that you were one of the only persons that didn't seem to retreat into yourself in the presence of a certain ballet- mistress (in fact, you were the first to make me laugh at her, but as I MAY have been eavesdropping that one time, I wont tell you that). I immediately thought two things; you will come to be better when her time passes, or, that  you will perpetuate her stoic icy reign in the macabre system that was apparently "how things were done" in the Company. I am glad to say, your batch's seniority and leadership is looked on as a time of the best in relation between company members across lines of senior/junior and male/female.

Throughout all this, my first two years, I observed, pleased, but silent. A silence that did not last much longer, as it is well known that when one of your closest friends is Mr R.V. McKenzie, sociable isn't a choice, its a non-negotiable consequence.

I Never knew I'd be a dancer or that I'd've met you...seeing this recently I'm reminded
the world is a very small place :)

I always wondered why you seemed not to want to teach when a piece was remounted, but in the end never questioned it (which was probably wise, my mouth seems to have no filter and knowing my dunce ways I might've sounded like I was judging). but I am grateful you gave me an intimate view of life as an architecture student, and gained me a new-found appreciation for not only you and your balance, but to another friend's struggle and concern. Jo-Ann, I was amazed at the workload, and awed you took very little break, all day at studio to change scenery for another studio only to go back and burn midnight oil. I watched...you were phenomenal (This was around the time of that UTech Vid en pointe...you were EVERYTHING!).

I was beginning to feel like my vocal cords wouldn't rupture if I dared speak to you unbidden, and I struck up (on my part) an uneasy acquaintanceship (I was still quite terrified of you). and slowly, I was made party to the group of persons who stood in the awesome space of friend and fan of the incomparable 'Jo'.

Then the unthinkable happened...Sir was setting a new work on us...and you chose me as your partner...

*Pause, while I again recover from being starstruck*

You probably didn't know that by simply choosing to be my partner you ensured I would work the hardest I had worked in dance up to this point. I. Was. Floored...and to this day, it produced my favourite artistic shot of me in life... and I will always have you to thank for it

you went past the platitudes other senior girls would usually say to us supporting men, and showed that you ACTUALLY trusted us, that we were worth something to the continuity and growth, the image of the Company Dance Theatre...

This year, with the lineup of such a varied undertaking, we were all excited and a little bit afraid of the mammoth task. I was worried that you were not as present as before, but was confident you would return, star up class and then go on to take the stage. you then returned from  hiatus, and all progressed(smoothly is not the word one uses for this period, so I'll simply say progressed). 

Then you repeated the untinkable: in remounting the ballet RoseHall, you chose me...not once, but TWICE to be your partner...my glad bag jus' buss! I felt I had come full circle, that I did something right if I were worthy to be chosen again.

If you'll notice I have glossed over the negative bits, the espionage, the whisperings, mutterings and flare up that have caused this moment. I do so because they were to have been immaterial...and I somehow fear if it were anyone else, they would have been...Life, however, chooses who to be fair to.

I could join in the persons who decry and scream their resentment, raising my voice in protest...but I have never been a good orator, in fact, I don't think I communicate well at all...but I am standing there. I am standing there waiting to see you again recover from that fall, from the landing, from that moment of unexplained incident...I am waiting to be in awe again...the stage is not the same without you, and there is a heaviness that will remain with me until it has welcomed you back...

until then...I am Waiting. in the wings, in the audience, on my feet...I am waiting

Short Story

     "The Lord is risen."
     "He is risen indeed. Alleluia!" The congregation beamed at their new priest, a beatific expression on his face. Reveling in their admiration, proceeded to give a passionate (if a bit halted) sermon on the concepts of faith and doubt. Matthew, seated behind the lectern on the rostrum, stifled a yawn, shifting to discreetly wipe his eye on the sleeve of his starched white acolyte's robe. He glanced down at the floor, bathed in the colourful light from the stained glass window above and behind him. startled from his reverie by a blare of voices, he was forced back into the awareness of his surroundings by the choral wall of sound slamming him in the face and eardrums from the all too near speakers before him, their feed from the choir loft opposite him. "Typical," he thought with a wry chuckle "that on resurrection Sunday the choir chooses a song that is almost totally unrelated to the observance." This service, they decided to butcher Randall Stroope's "The Conversion of Saul". one of his favourite A Cappella anthems. he did an inward cringe that very nearly became external. schooling his face into what he hoped was an appropriately reverent expression, he continued to muse "I can see why the new churches shout, God would probably have on earmuffs permanently after innumerable Sundays like this." he chuckled at his own joke, glancing up to the choir loft, following the exuberant gestures of the group's director, the aging but surprisingly robust Mr Deacon Dean. He chuckled again, almost chortling suppressed into a snort. At the final "Alleluia!" of the anthem; a warped, jagged and much flattened chord ringing through the chapel, aresounding "AMEN!" sounded from the congregation: whether to communicate their relief or one of congratulation was a matter of opinion (it wasn't).
      At the end of the benediction, Matthew took the cruciform back to the altar and proceeded to the changing room to remove the "linens of office" and again become "just Matt", holding off his canonization another week (another chuckle)

Short Story again...

So, I WAS going to write something personal...but then I do as I always do when I realise Ive gone too deep, and end up avoiding self probing in favour of something light...Here Goes

“In May…I remember…roses…”

“Must be nice, to remember” I mused aloud, as I stood in the kitchen, snatches of Mrs Harcourt’s garbled musings floating by on the air, her haunting voice still sonorous after decades off the stage. It has been my weekly duty to maintain the home of our neighbourhood’s ‘sweet old lady next door’, often foregoing the awkward social dance of adolescence so wholly embraced by everyone else my age. I had stepped in for a glass of lemonade, and a brief respite from the summer sun’s fierce onslaught as I toiled at the flower beds beneath the Porch and front windows.

“Oh, and dancing! Such delightful dancing that it was as if we moved on clouds and not the flagged stone floors of the great hall…”I poked my head in the sunroom, where she sat on her spindly chintz armchair, a delicate demitasse poised at her lips for a dainty sip. She looked absently at the table before her, on which she had arrayed her complete discography, then to the chair identical and opposite her own.

“Then when they had announced that there was a starlet amongst the crowd, such a twitter rose around me, whisperings and murmurings as everyone tried to figure out who the celebrity was. I was tickled pink,” here, she hid a giggle behind a tiny palm. “Though outwardly to my escort I feigned displeasure at the loss of my privacy…” I observe her beatific smile in profile, blushing as my presence went unnoticed.

“Mrs Harcourt? Are you okay in here?” just my first time, and I hated this; intruding on her reverie. Though her daughter insists it was not healthy. In my opinion, if it makes her happy, doesn’t she deserve to do it?

“Oh Anthony, I didn’t hear you come in, I’m just here regaling Ms Bradbury about the early days of my career.” She gestures to the empty armchair opposite her expectantly, turning her head in that slow graceful manner. Thus gently imperioused, I turned, and in my most polite voice uttered:

“A pleasure, Ms Bradbury, how are you this fine afternoon?” I looked in earnest at the armchair, as if, for all intents I were really seeing her interviewer.

“I am just splendid Anthony, My dear friend Agatha speaks quite fondly of you. How are the camellia’s coming?” so utterly shocked at the response I dazedly look back at Mrs Harcourt, on whose face is the most puckish grin. After a growing silence, in which I contemplate my sanity, she asks, still with a glint of mischief in her eye

“Well? How are the new darlings of my garden Anthony?”

“They thrive well.” I answer, my voice suspiciously thin. “The grafting was successful, and they should be budding any time now.”

“Oh, I am glad to hear it, I do so look forward to my visit next month.”

“Next month ma’am?” I quickly turn my gaze to the armchair, then shift back to Mrs Harcourt in three quick volleys, my confusion growing.

“Yes, it’s why I called, I had just come back to the states and thought to chat up Aggie here, one thing led to another and now we’re still here talking, lost to the past. Forgive us old ladies our long reminiscences.”

“That’s not the reason for our dear Anthony’s bewilderment I’m afraid.” Said my host, impish with delight. “He seems to have thought, and I assume with influence from Sarah, my eldest, that I was engaging myself-or worse, some invisible entity- in avid conversation!” Ms Bradbury makes rushed breaths that I slowly come to realise is laughter. “Oh, but you should have seen the look on his face as he said good day to the armchair!” she again daintily giggled behind her delicate hand. I shook my head and politely withdrew from the room, an embarrassed chuckle escaping as I opened the doors back out onto the lawn.

Word-Soul-Redbones Edition II

OMG!!!!!! *squeals in excite createment*

ok...well, no, I'm not known to be "starstruck" but this was cause for some excitement.
I got to meet The Awesome Ms Tanya Stephens!!!!!

Mario, TANYA, Davell and I after the show

  the second staging of Tribe Sankofa's "Word-Soul-Redbones edition" at the Redbones blues cafe was every bit as entertaining as i'd hoped with the double whammy bonus of seeing Tanya Stephens performing some of the standards I love from her rep, even bussing a piece of Boom Wuk *YESSS!!!* ***(((Pauses here to acknowledge the awesomeness that is Renee Imani McDonald, dancer extraordinare LOVE seeing her perform)))***, and seeing the awesome Michael-Sean Harris Perform -wait for it- Mountain! this song I LOVE! God hearing it live again was awesome, a shame Kevan wasnt there to play the necessary and very sexy kumina rhythm as accompaniment...then there was his singing wining on the table top *goes full retard in privacy of room*...all in all a splendid show, mad props to le bestie Hanief the group's musical director, and Davell Thompson, who is just a bowl of awesomeness...Special praise to Aldane and Javed, hard to believe my younglings from Ardenne are now out in the world *sniff*

Feeling...tired

I run...
clutching that parcel so close to my chest
My breath ragged gasps
barely enough to sustain my effort...
I am sure I will expire soon
one can operate on borrowed strength for so long
and the miracle that I have not yet collapsed begs that I continue
that I hold on despite all that would have me expire
I owe it...
to wherever this energy springs from

...right?

random scene...

We spent the day simply enjoying the cool of the river and the warmth of the sun, walked and waded, laughed and chased each other as the sun moved higher then lower in the sky...I sat by you...we reclined by the side of a clear cool spring, speaking of things not yet come, of our fears, of our joys, the sun falling on our tranquil forms, shadows falling on the serpentine water, meandering down and away from us...

"What of the evenings when you go off by yourself? what do you do then?" you gaze at me, face cocked to the side in that adorable why, eyes aloof yet intent. I reach up and put a lock of your hair behind your ear, from the vantage point of your lap I see the lines of life on your beautifully angled face, caressed as it were, by  the hands of time. I close my eyes and delay, allowing my face to slacken as if in absent thought, though we both know what I intend to say; this question is never new to our talks.

            "I go to commune with myself and nature..." I open my eyes and look bemusedly as the lock I moved falls right back to its place. "when alone, I feel lighter, disjoint from all the things that make me feel weary...its sort of like little retreats to recharge the energy supply I drain through interaction."
               "and do I add to the heaviness?" your grin is positively impish, as your hand is rested on my head and my cheek, framing where your sundress has not so I am surrounded by your touch and the heady scent of you...
               "you don't, and you're quite aware you do not, but if I ever take you with me there'd be no stillness my dear." a soft chuckle is stopped in your throat, you look into my eyes, and not for the first time I feel you see way beyond the surface of who I am.
                 "I often wonder if you think of me when you're in that space." you look at my hair, knowing you needn't see my eyes to know that my next words will be true.
                "always, my dear, you are my anchor, and so long as I am moored with you I have bliss." you find my gaze and we share a smile, joy illuminating your face until the sun behind the canopy of branches pales in comparison. we pack our things and leave our secret place, your arm in mine as we always travel, an easy grace bred of affectionate familiarity...