Peeling Back the Bubble Wrap

Peeling Back the Bubble Wrap Peeling back the bubble wrap on the ancient of days, Back to when Nixon was still presiding, He, leading with paranoid deliberations, Sold his yeses to the Goldbricks, and the Mustard Men; And while he was dipping into the rubbery tides of the latex surfers, I found your shadowy pointing breasts, shivering outside my backdoor. You were standing in the dark, waiting for me to turn the key… 1973 was the year you taught me how to love a woman; You, at 21 years, and me, ensconced in the stereo-lit darkness, Of my dimly-lit bedroom on Hoover street; You, wearing a wool skirt and that ruffled low-curving blouse, With those tan buttons, like a half dozen corks, ready to be popped, And you, sitting at my black upright piano, The 1907 Schumann, made of stubborn black mahogany, and You, with your long curved nails, femininely tapping the ivories, Soliciting an intimate song I have since forgotten, but can still hear, Your cylindrical tan legs pressing the piano pedals, Like a fragile dancer made of fine glass, and You, exploring human desire with determined pressings. And then, into your garlanded home we strolled, Hand in hand; And with our lips, we cleared the stoney path Leading into the sun garden, amongst the cats and the posies, And found astonished silhouettes behind the peephole. Still peeling back the bubble wrap on the ancient of days, Back to when my door was locked, and a green candle burned therein; I saw you in the naked flickering, riding the tree of silver ascensions, And with five pulsing fingers, I eagerly picked your finest flowers, over there, Inside the throbbing, sun-lit bed of this poised sun garden; then, You told me you loved me. Told me what I never wanted to hear, “Even now, with me on top of you, in this silent grinding darkness, I cannot bring myself to lie and say, ‘I love you.’ There is something about you I don’t want to know. Yours is a long and complicated book I do not wish to read. Your mind I cannot calibrate, or truly understand, so…I am sorry. I deserve to be called an ass, deserve to be brushed off like a gnat, but With you, my shoes never seemed to fit. My ears never seemed to hear.” ...when the copter went down, witnesses heard you scream… “I am truly sorry.”