Wednesday, February 21, 2007

The Sunrise Café

It began in the Greek Isles.
Sunrise café.
The sky colored itself violet that day.
Violet, like the stripe in Joseph's coat.
Violet, like one of Picasso's overused pallettes.
Fish line-danced in a jello green sea.
You set your backpack next to mine,
asked if you could buy me a cuppa,
then read me your poem about Froggie.
I sang you a Dylan song. Badly.
You applauded, anyway.
You were far too skinny then
and I was too lost in my sadness, but
we held hands and talked
while the sea whimpered and snakes
shed their skin in the nearly grass.

We met up again in Rome, then Paris.
In London, we rented a coldwater flat
and slept nude and shivering,
daring only a kiss, come midnight.
You married a black-eyed girl
two years later, you wrote me,
and I wed a roving sailor.

Somehow we seemed to know
that you coming inside of me
would carry us down some road
we weren't yet ready to take,
when we really needed to end up here.
This time. This now,
our hearts tinted violet and green
like a morning rainbow,
our faces flush with remembrance.

10 comments:

Lyle Daggett said...

Oh, the roads this takes me down...

Lovely, lovely poem, Pris.

Pris said...

Thanks, Lyle. You must write about some of those roads, yourself, sometime.

Russell Ragsdale said...

Hi Pris! Wonderful and well painted (colored) travel, plus the magic carpet of time - lovely poem. Velvet experiences to wrap up in!

polona said...

oh, i love this one, pris!

Pris said...

Russell and polona, thank you so much!

Pat Paulk said...

Ah, memory lane of lover's past. Love it!!

gautami tripathy said...

Memory lane...I like this.

Pris said...

Thank you guys for your commments!

Joyce Ellen Davis said...

This is really nice! Maybe I'll look a ways down this lane...or, maybe not. But I'm glad you did!

Pris said...

I don't look back at the ones I parted from with bad feelings, but the good ones, it's nice. Thanks!