love

a warm call under a warm feather duvet worn like a lover a full half hour before the alarm sounds its ghastly racket. a portable phone flexing its 900MHz across the thousands of kilometers spanning the skin of my duvet, the space of air to the base, and the grand land of the New World, the Peaceful Sea, and a POTS, copper wire, fibre optics, satellite, spread spectrum, repeaters, switching, bandwidth, international subset, substrate, irradiating the rubbery leather of the Sperm hunting the giant giant prehensile squid. where the pipe is laid, where the optics chirp their handshake, their telephony, their protocol, their laser beam words. enough to convey softness the same way it was harsh before, the way it conveys sadness and apology the same way it was hurt before. complaining about the static. complaining about the clicks of the rushing pod of porpoise and the moaning of the migrating humpback as it tries to sing us back to sweet sleep.

She reminded me of someone once and never more.
The voice it was and the blond hair.
The similarities end there.

A silver locket
cupid embossing the front
in relief
the heart shape
the missing chain.
There is a small indentation
in the side, used to pry open
the halves of the locket.

A silver heart-shaped locket.

A sterling silver heart-shaped locket.
Cupid, the cherub, embossed on the front,
a groove to open the closed halves.
The locket has not a chain
it can't be worn
it sits in a black velvet box
it waits for saint valentine

a man sits together with a woman on the stone bench near the rails. his eyes stroke the curls she absolutely will not brush from her face. the dirty blond curls, more waves than curls. the tips of the curls are almost white, still bleached from the summer. this is winter, waiting together for the blue line in washington. the metro never takes very long. it hovers to rest with a spaceship electronic whine. the woman runs her finger through her hair and behind her ear, keeping all but one long strand from again falling into her eyes. the man is young, but older than the woman.

she wears a green cardigan over a cotton shirt, tucked into heavy jeans. she wears tan leather work shoes. chunky tomboy urban wear. she has always dressed like this, even when in the office. soft translucent skin, moist and white. hints of blush in the cheeks. rough denim and soft skin. golden hair and golden wires holding her glasses on. he is bigger than she. he is wider and much taller. bearded. ruddy. heavy. with curious eyes that look at her, then the train.

he moves slowly, carefully for his mass is dangerous to others if unchecked. unchecked movement, even friendly claps, may throw another against a wall. They sit so that their knees touch. not from love but from comfort. because they have known each other for so long and can speak or move with ease. because they are friends. he scratches his beard and runs a hand through his hair. its to his shoulders uncut and dark brown. black jeans. steel toed boot, scuffed and brown.