Petals and Beagles

Petals and Beagles
by Stephen Earley Jordan II

I wish I knew who lived above me in apartment 4C.

At 3:17am on fridays, tuesdays and wednesdays
and sometimes mondays and thursdays,
I hear rose petals crushed under workboots,
homemade butterscotch stirred
with a wooden-handle spoon,
cartoons switching to reruns of MASH.

I wake myself sweating
like your mother's menstruation (long gone),
wiping myself in 500-count silk sheets,
remembering when you forced me to watch
Comet and Snickers, your childhood male beagles,
give IT to each other, grunting and barking and panting
while I shivered in the corner of the toolshed
your father made just for them,
the hamsters, gerbils, and rabbits.
With a slight grin, eyebrow raised,
smelling of aqua velva aftershave,
and bubbalicious bubble gum,
you said, "This is between us."

You were sent away, somewhere far away
like a deferred dream,
where falling stars are caught
and placed into position by black cherubs,
where boys become men
with blinded wives,
and you will forget me.

Eartha Kitt (R.I.P.)

From the depths

The summer smothers me, turns me into a monster. I hide so you don't see my scales, my warts, my breath of fire, my abracadabra-hocus-pocus magic I use to haunt. I hide.

The season changes and I am returned to my leveled state of mind.

It is winter. You saw the first snow from your window. But you dare not go outside. It's too cold. You're too preoccupied. Until then. Yes! Then! You see it! The green. Among the dead earth, trees, branches. You see it emerging from the snow, peeking its stalk from the depths of snow. And you knew that you must save it. And you left your warmth, your home, your solitude to rescue it from the cold.

You saw life. You saw hope. You saw me.

I've returned.