Sandalwood
They are playing that song again
The one that reminds me of you
It began to rewind as I turned up the dial
from a place long ago that's been bleached for awhile
"California Dreamin" sifts through the air
like the sandalwood incense, that used to be there.
"All the leaves are brown, and the sky is grey
I've been for a walk ....On a winter's day"
There's an image I've kept, still tucked within my mind
It used to fill me with envy, until it reckoned with time
You at twenty-one, wild and beautiful in a way that I could never be
Perched upon your back-porch steps, beneath the russet trees
Soaking up the morning sun, stroking your guitar
I only knew you then, as that 'hippie" type of girl
The one who lived next-door that year
Your candles shimmering, bangles glimmering
A tangle of strawberry hair, that flirted with the wind
Childlike and fair, devil-may-care, long gypsy skirts,
and a peasant look that took one's breath
The faint scent of sandalwood, swept into my yard
from your wide-opened windows, wide-opened doors,
while I was wrangling a baby on my hip
or hanging bleached-white sheets onto a clothesline
I had often wished I were you, ... flitting about, barefoot in the morning air
But, I was teaching my toddler to tie his shoes
Both of us twenty-one, ... on two sides of a cedar fence, ...
a thousand light years apart
"All the leaves are brown, and the sky is grey
I've been for a walk,...on this winter's day
All the leaves are brown. Songs have come and gone
Seasons had their songs, but what became of you?"
_____________________________________________________
Copyright © Carrie Richards | Year Posted 2013
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