Chasing Ivory

My blonde phoebe at the time,
she fell in love with you openly
looking off into the rays coming through
the multicolored curtains, imagining deep romances
as your fingers flowed across the cracked ivory
looking straight at me with emerald eyes,
light dancing through your long eyelashes
making me blush and glance away.
She asked me if she could love you
I shrugged and said
“the heart wants what it wants”
and yes, I guess it still does.

She regaled me with stories of you.
I sat silently and absorbed it all
pretending I was the one taking walks
along the pier with you,
listening to your stories
– you told wonderful stories
in that voice that went down like warm honey –
holding your hand,
tangled in the sheets,
tired and satisfied.

I didn’t wear makeup that day,
and you saw me and held my gaze,
raised your elegant composer’s hand up and
gently
pushed my hair out of my eyes.
Fingers tracing a melody on my skin
– I can still hear it some nights –
you didn’t need to say anything,
usual eloquence embodied in a gesture.

I forget her name, but you stayed with a hippie
(I was too afraid to host you, too close to my bed)
House full of artwork and a huge trampoline
in her chaotic jungle, plant-filled backyard.
Your eyes lit up and you grabbed my hand,
not hers
heading for the huge canvas suspended in the center.
So I reached for hers
and we skipped forward like three human puppies.
You kept bumping into me “accidentally”
while she chased you around, craving touch.

I’ve never been jealous of anyone
not really, because what’s the point,
but when she described
the softness, fullness of your lips…
I looked away,
stepped back from my own little fantasy,
tired but unsatisfied.

Image is mine.