Fatal Attraction
"Fatal Attraction"
The letter was typewritten
IBM Selectric,
No final salutation
in italics
“With love”,
but it was there nevertheless
invisible
electric
“VC”
Bleeding Bold Black
thick cursive stroke
With knife point calculation
An arrow hit it’s bullseye
A flourish with intent
A nicotine stain
at the bottom of the page
Thumb print
Mixed with a blur of
Faded ink
The type punched into the page
By a spinning silver ball
a small deadly bullet
able to repeat repetition
repeat repetition
and hit it's mark
At lightning speed from brain
Falling onto the reader’s heart
Like pounding black rain
“Finding an ounce of good in that….”
the third para read,
“Is like finding one grain of sand in a Sea of Mud…
Close the door now, walk away, before it is too late”
His words held a certain power
But not strong enough to contain
The breeding rabbits running loose
In my brain
This was LOVE wasn’t it,
For all time,
a soliloquy, a
a brave, yet stupid
Statement
not a wary question
And there was a certain danger in that
A final rebellious act
To not heed sage warning
Make my stand against childhood
And a parent’s worthy pact
Dangling one’s heart over the edge
Holding onto the Other’s stories
Holding onto Hope,
hoping for
Victory in the face of lies
and fallen Glory
Walking barefoot
On the Other’s razor’s edge
Holding on
was the balancing act
Raising the slippery bar higher
“Saying your sorry doesn’t mean you’re sorry”
Hailstones like fists hit your face
Your gut's winded dodging ghosts
Perhaps you thought you’d win the race
You thought you were escaping
High quality paper, thicker than most
Stiff, proper, not white,
sometimes mistaken for
"A pale shade of yellow",
he said once in jovial debate
over the breakfast table
with strong black tea, no sugar and cream buns,
“The colour's brave. It’s ‘Buff’,”
we all laughed,
I said,
“Like naked, unafraid?”
I kept the letter,
It was read again,
years later,
the words were like some prophecy
to put a person firmly in their place
In the fatal hours
When one looks for lost grace
Purple flowers spreading
Over skin that’s no longer thin
A Balancing Act and like
Groundhog day
it never ends it just begins
Chapters broken are recipes
for your Winter season
With a growing belly
Something new
punches you from within
Walking barefoot
On the Other’s razor’s edge
Sharp as a tightrope
Invisible where it doesn’t show
In the heart
Purple flowers spreading
(Lovejoy-Burton/June 2018)
Copyright © Leanne Lovejoy-Burton | Year Posted 2018
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