Haiku
26
A mockingbird’s song,
The fragrance of tea olives,
Tat tat tat—roofers.
Lyman
2020
La Geographia
When I lightly touch
her left calf, the warmth of her skin surprises me. The room, too, is warm, and
the lights are low so that the shadow of my hand when I lift it above her leg
only allows for the outline of Norway that has been inked so that Kristiansand
is far down on her Achilles tendon.
But I should
return to the first moment when I meet Anna at the door. Her eyes are the
darkest that can only be imagined even after they have been seen. They are the
black of some other life form, some other world.
I squeeze her calf
in such a way that her muscle involuntarily flexes. And again. I wait a moment,
listening to her breathing.
The right calf is
Thailand. I push my index finger into the muscle where I reckon Bangkok to
be. Surpressing a laugh, I am in a tuk
tuk, I am taking the first bite of a garlic omelet, I am fondling Tasanee, we
are laughing.
Anna’s breathing is still shallow.
Tasanee and I are
sharing a glass of fresh papaya juice. The morning sun arrives and Chakkarat is
quiet and we are wrapped into our silence.
Sometimes, while
taking a coffee at the bookstore that is behind the museum in what is called
the Quarter, I tell myself that the next woman who walks through the door will
be the love of my life. My Uncle Tomas tells me that no one meets the love of
his life among the stacks of books. Although he is married now for 52 years, he
proclaims loudly the death of love in 1959 even as Aunt Margaret wipes down the
several tables that are squeezed in the area between the front door and cash
register. Love is dead, he shouts. Love. Is. Dead.
Cuba floats across
the small of Anna’s back, just wider than the span of my hand. I measure, the
tip of my thumb just reaching to Sandino. My little finger tapping lightly at Baracoa.
My restive grandmother’s Cuba. My reluctant grandfather’s Cuba. Havana the
reward for the weekly sales that became monthy records unheard of until my grandfather
began selling Chevys for the first dealership to open in Tarpon Springs.
I return to Anna’s
eyes. That very first look into those eyes. My knees, in fact, may have buckled
if ever so slightly.
I spread my hands
so that my thumbs press down to either side of her spine. Chambas sits down,
protected from the slow circles my thumbs describe. Chambas, city of cigar
makers. Back with my father who takes me across the Gandy Bridge and back to
the place of his birth and into Ybor City somewhere along Palm Avenue to find
the pork sandwiches of his childhood.
Slipping between
her knees, I rest my hands on Anna’s thighs and lean forward and I kiss Nueva
Gerona. I kiss Manzanillo. I kiss Finca Vigia.
The first time, when
I let Anna in from the rain through the heavy door even though the bookstore
would not open for another 15 minutes, I called to Aunt Margaret for two
coffees and a towel.
“Love. Is. Dead!”
My uncle shook his head at the two of us and then picked up four empty boxes and
trudged back to the storeroom.
And so, her eyes.
North Charleston 2012
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