Obelisk: The Third Night

The Third Night of the Poem
of the Body

 

style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt">He felt her waiting for him like an
obelisk, still and grave yet quivering with desire. He felt him waiting
for her. Wind was rising outside the windows and it tore scraps of
paper into words and then the words became butterflies in his chest,
and he was a boy again. He came to the crowded room.

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style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt">When he saw her, his whole being
streamed like a long trail of sparks, without heat or light, to
surround her grave sweet face, a halo of desire about her, all of the
words he ever had spoken?.anything, in any lifetime?like the sparks
scattering, then flaming out?

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class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt">The crowd, the noise,
everything confusing?he lost her. Stupid. Stupid. The elephant stepping
on its nose. All the coarseness and crudeness like a chorus of crows.
Her slim gleaming beauty like moonlight, sullied by clouds of
smoke?&;amp; he lost her in the crush?his heart then fleeing, racing
after her?but she was already gone.

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class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt">In the cavern, calling
into its shadows, he asked her if he should sit with her or tell her a
story. A story, she said. So he told her the story of the strangeness
and difference, the stars that he saw that no one else did, and the
wounds. He told her why he loved her. He told her about the
boy.

 

style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt">It was late and so much turmoil. He
could barely remain awake though in his spirit a hawk circled wanting
her flesh. All night, after she left, his heart was troubled, waking
him.

 

style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt">In the morning they spoke again, and in
the daylight her soul was clear to him again. He pressed her lips to
his hand. He knew then-he knew everything. He knew what he wanted. Her
voice made a white flower in his heart.

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style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt">This is the third night of the poem of
the body.