Option
The second she says
hello,
that breathy essence of
voice
gives her secret away.
My brain fills in the
rest.
The tall runway model
I only met once before
is calling me from a
hotel
a short cab ride away,
asking me to stop my
life
to play her generous
saviour,
dedicated accomplice
to her present need.
It is the kind of
challenge
this chaotic universe
provides,
two weeks from
impending
wedding to my best
friend,
a very different
proposition,
a gradual denouement,
a slow boil that has
simmered its way
into comfy heart stew
of tenderized vows
and chunks of affection,
filling comforts
protecting
against any soul’s
winter,
oozing safe warmth
like a favourite
flannel.
Of course, my mind
replays
that weekend in Dallas:
national sales conference,
getting to
connect faces
to voices spoken to each
week,
territorial reps who
handled
military base cosmetic
sales
for respective assigned
regions.
Smart, independent
women,
accomplished workers who
walked the walk and
looked the part,
all paying me extra
attention
as the young guy from
corporate
whose favour may turn out
to be
something worth
nurturing
in the long run of
career growth.
Three days of breakout
rooms
with coffee and Danish
fuelling
fantasies and grand
designs.
She ran Georgia and
Florida,
but she had bigger
plans.
In that hotel room bed
she told me all about
them:
modelling and investing,
jet-setting across a
globe
full of
infinite wealth and glamor.
It was one splendiferous
weekend
out of a few decades and
change,
one she knew I’d never
forget.
When I answered the call
in my impressive corner
office
that otherwise drab
afternoon,
I had no idea of the
inexplicable
sad desperation that
cried out
in half dare,
challenging me to
throw what had been a
semblance
of a life assembled over
years
of hard work’s stable
dedication
into a raging dumpster
fire
of crazy passion
pursued.
She was smart,
beautiful,
reckless, and all
mine,
she assured me, if
only
I could find my way
there
within the current
hour,
out the corporate
door
into a speeding
taxi
that would transport
me
from the illusion of
security
to one of irresponsible
yearning
and dangerous
hypotheticals.
I looked down, out the
window
at the tiny yellow cabs
navigating
the Park Avenue traffic
each way,
carrying the careless
and farfetched
to unlikely
destinations, lives that held
no purchase in this
compromised reality
where I had secured a
gym subscription,
a favourite dry cleaner,
and a local deli
that knew my favourite
lunch order.
She knew she was calling
no adventurer,
that there were shackles
keeping me here
and what’s worse was how
I knew she knew.
I swallowed hard at what
had to be
the metallic taste of
hard regret,
inevitable whenever I
proved
somehow not quite
invincible.
The clock’s hands slowed
accordingly,
and never again did I
ever encounter
that sweet inviting
voice or its alluringly
tempting offer of
unexpected abandon.
In the years since, I’ve
learned to convince
my bruised ego that it
never happened.
Nothing could ever
interrupt the steady
conveyor belt of my own
chosen runway.
Like a well-blended
creamy foundation applied,
all unsightly blemishes
and pores disappear
after a fashion, and the
illusion is complete:
An unsurprising life has
its own rewards.
One Bad Man Leads to Another
In the blink of an eye, this creative dupe
is replaced by another, perhaps not
as flawed,
less busily tethered to family
group,
perhaps not as eagerly shedding
soul’s blood.
This modern reality’s infinite
choices,
each worse than the next, despite
having hopes yet.
Each seeming success, a chance to
tout numbers,
to lure next big fish into awaiting
net.
It’s fantastical, yet the irascible
one
reminds what a female prerogative’s
for:
reeling in one who will gladly comply
in promising easily, willingly,
more.
Claiming pure faith in his talented
writings,
she fails to invest in a single
collection.
Ignoring the facts, yet insisting on
trusting,
her charity trades upon blamed
misdirection.
But no social media’s as simple as
that,
and such hesitation further
frustrates her.
She wants all his essence, his
talents, his passion,
his free time, emotions, and role as
creator.
She hates to wait, but loves to go
shopping
for designer brands that can brand
her success.
Such spoils decisively expose this
sad ruse
as all about money and no politesse.
Avoiding the long term, she crunches
numbers,
working to reduce the risk versus
need.
According to her, even little
successes
provoke the desire’s insatiable
greed.
She’ll claim to keep keeping things
so very simple,
as latest bad man calls her romantic
bluff.
She’ll chide him as indecisive and
fearful
until he falls out, when he’s had
quite enough.
And thus spins the cycle, the next
one emerges,
obsessed with the charm of her
perfect good looks.
A bad man, a worse one, or even a
monster
who takes the bait quickly, not
feeling the hook.
Crisis of Reflection
Textures,
colours, skin.
This
new day dawning,
a
swift surprise sprung.
Eerie
impossibility
become
veritable reality.
An
artifact of scrambled dreams,
asserted
through careful deliberation,
a
reflection, a phone’s camera,
a
peek beneath pajamas.
An
oddly complacent swap.
The
voice in his head said
take a breath, all else is familiar,
but
the bathroom mirror does not lie.
A
strange face has taken over,
replacing,
removing what came before.
Internal
earthquake, vibration rising.
Let
this day start again. Mulligan, please?
But
no reversal occurs. Who is this stranger?
Baby
steps. A bite for breakfast, chewed with
new
teeth assisting a familiar appetite.
An
abounding solitude surrounding
this
unidentified identity,
confounding
without comfort.
Yet
another inexplicable event,
rare
but not unheard of.
Hiding
from the beatings life delivers,
like
trying to hit an unexpected curveball.
Gentle
dreams disarm, lure him in
with
softness of a willow, weeping
for
the heavy lift of change underway.
The
mood is hard to discern. He learns
by
shifts, a fraught quietude, a pretend calm.
No
laws to enforce, more hold off and see.
These
different perceptions are caustic, costly.
A
hard handshake to cover inner turmoil,
and
a lifetime of regrets as false memory dictates.
This
is his revisionist legacy, as many reject this new
skin
surrounding him, the dark blight of inspired
fresh
tensions, arguments simmering just beneath boil,
a
world of punches just one clenched fist away.
What
happens next in such a resistant world?
Extremists
feed their propaganda to hungry masses,
motivated
by fear and armed with a distrust of everything
and
a simple need to connect the dots into a recognizable whole.
Minutes
slow to painful seconds that pass without relief.
This
new voice, gruff with history, mumbles and shouts
about
shadowy misunderstandings, years of struggle without reason.
The
forced distance now palpable, muffled grunts of angry acceptance,
a
slow coming of rage, shot between the breastplate of identity,
the
assumed heartbeat of woozy pride, timing the unrehearsed scenes
of
a stranger’s life lived in the recesses of a foggy penumbra.
Get
used to the new numbers, the metamorphosis from
insensibility
to discovered sensitivity that raises the ante.
It’s
a slow trudge through history, but a quick transition.
This, he tells his incredulous brethren, is
the new majority.
Gary Glauber is a widely
published poet, fiction writer, teacher, and former music journalist. He has
five collections, Small Consolations (Aldrich Press), Worth the
Candle (Five Oaks Press), Rocky Landscape with Vagrants (Cyberwit), A
Careful Contrition (Shanti Arts Publishing) and most recently, Inside
Outrage (Sheila-Na-Gig Editions). He also has two chapbooks, Memory
Marries Desire (Finishing Line Press) and The Covalence of Equanimity (SurVision
Books), a winner of the 2019 James Tate International Poetry Prize.
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