After the Interim
She met him in the interim,
that space between endings and beginnings;
a summer fling;
a sowing of her not so wild oats
was all that it was meant to be.
But he was so much more.
She found herself languishing
pool side on his patio
as long June afternoons
dripped like molasses into nights.
Sometime in July,
her illusion that she’d had of independence
burst like pyrotechnics in the sky.
And oh, those nights they imbibed!
Her nights with him ran
like the blood-red wine
in the goblets
cupped
by the trembling hands of two inebriates.
But the stems of those goblets
slipped quickly from their fingers,
and love’s elixir
spilled much too quickly
into tomorrow.
Along with the dry protracted days,
she - like desert grasses -
withered as she waited.
always thirsting for the nights!
But by the time August had arrived,
she also had come to realize that,
like the yellowed grasses,
she needed more than passion at dusk.
The nights, in fact,
had brought her
no less scorching than the sun.
And what she’d thought
was more than she could want
became much less
than he could ever give.
Some essential thing was lacking,
some need deep inside her
not being fulfilled.
In those long afternoons
as she'd waited for him,
she'd come to realize what was missing.
By September - back in school -
she knew her ardor for him
had barely waned,
yet still. . .
she knew what she had to do.
And so, she looked to autumn's advent
for October's cooling winds
to sweep away
the remnants
of ashes in her soul.
2/26/2015
For Laura Loo's Free Verse on Sadness (again) Poetry Contest
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