BUTTERFLY NIGHTS

They lay there, side by side...the heat penetrating the space between them. She would not dare turn, and he, reading her thoughts, reached for the flickering light beside him. The string of smoke spiraled into the thick blackness, leaving only the spark of scented wax.

She felt his stare on her and a coyness followed.

He moved his fingers slightly, disturbing the still quiet that filled the heated space.

'Should I turn'? She wondered as she let a narrow wisp of air through her thin lips. The cold wind burnt her bare arms as it sliced across the room through the open window. The curtains, rejoicing in this action, danced about mid air letting in dull light from the covered moon.

In this moment of excitement, he turned towards her, dragging with him all the weight, built up in his chest. He watched as she tried to stealthily pull the covers over her porous skin.

'Are you col..'
'No' she quivered before he could finish...

'Are you cold?'

'Who me?'. He foolishly asked.

'I'm fine..'

An hour must have gone by in that exploding silence with both, sculpted in place.she, facing the open window,he, sunken into the bed on his side.

Goodnight. She finally whispered.

Sleep well...he responded.

And then, the air was light again. She moved to her side in one featherlight move, he swiftly turned on his back, and they both watched as dreams handed them the courage to finally touch.

BLUE EYED JEDI.

I have loved Ray lamontagne since he first seeped into my heart. He speaks truths that rip my heart open. He quiets my thoughts so that I am alive to nothing in the world but his crusty voice; and he has been able to do this until today.

My heart is so full. My head is spinning trying to keep this infinite string of thoughts from suffocating me. See, the universe aligned in the most unexpected of ways to give me, a little girl lost in this big universe, my very own Jedi.  This jedi was, as expected, mystical. His skin was lined with angels so his every touch would be heavenly. His mouth was filled with tenderness speaking kind truths carried by the blunt smell of tobacco and coffee. 

Those blue crystals could see into the future and they looked through me with such ease, burning down all inhibitions, all facades so that I was always naked before him. 

I was not a good girl, I was not on santas list for Christmas but I was consumed. I always travelled with him in every story. I rose and fell with the dying sound of his laughter. I was his for saving. 

This jedi, the master- my jedi, my master- then distorted the balance he had walked with unmatched precision. The energies were all wrong and the force of ease became a battle of colors; Blacks and whites fighting for clarity ending up a messy pool of blurry gray.  

Yes our eyes met. Yes his spirit lifted mine in rainbow streaks. Yes, the gods lived in the warmth of his smile- but no, he was never mine. He was a temporary reprieve to an ailing girl looking for positive energy.

The jedi left, and he took with him all doubt that heaven does not exist. 

You see, I have lived in it; in his bosom, a den of cherubs lined with beautifully chiseled force. 

I have tasted heaven. 

His stories. 

His company.

Him.

...And so I look to the sunset, Ray lamontagne slowly regaining control over me, waiting in the energy of his force, until the sun turns black.

Always

I am not jealous

of what came before me.

Come with a man
on your shoulders,
come with a hundred men in your hair,
come with a thousand men between your breasts and your feet,
come like a river
full of drowned men
which flows down to the wild sea,
to the eternal surf, to Time!

Bring them all
to where I am waiting for you;
we shall always be alone,
we shall always be you and I
alone on earth,
to start our life!

Pablo Neruda

Bmbay Bicycle.

I have forgotten the taste of love; the sound of silence slowly filling uncertain futures. 

What was that feeling of exhilaration? How did my mouth form those strange syllables?

My tongue craves those dripping afternoons. 

In your own time, come back to me.

Gently shake me from this blurry space and illuminate my dreams.

In your own time, come back to me.

love.

'Love means the body, the soul, the life, the entire being. We feel love as we feel the warmth of our blood, we breathe love as we breathe air, we hold it in ourselves as we hold our thoughts. Nothing more exists for us.'

Maupassant, Guy de

Truly. Madly. Deeply.

I was told that love can never be wrong.

That even if you fall in love with a person who is already married with seven children and is committed to their marriage and partner, it is still not wrong .

I want to believe that, but certain situations in my life…and others around me, have led me to think differently.

He was seven years older than me. A musician. Handsome. Tender.

I was young.  Foolish.  Intoxicated by his every breath.

I don’t remember when I knew; but  it was undeniable. My heart sat in a comfortable blur. The sharp lines of day and night softened into dusk and dawn.  my thoughts always travelled to his scent. My arms were forever in his warmth.  M world revolved because of him.

He would always say those words to me. Whisper them in a crowded bus. Mouth them after playing me a song. Always very gently and with a tenderness I have never understood. He was the father of my children..He would always say that. Little girls with my nose and his musical ear.

In a word, it was intense.

I was burning in a fire of fervor and it made me severely uncomfortable. I was a slave to those three words. My revolving world was moving too fast and I needed some air.

There are days when I miss that intensity. Him. The music.

There is also a part of me that knows without a doubt that it was not right. I was lost, and on some days, I think he was too. Somewhere in that crimson delight, we forgot about the rainbow. lost perspective.

That love… it took away from me. It ate at me and almost destroyed me.

I am no connoisseur, but I know enough to understand that truly, madly and deeply can also be dangerously, venomously and deathly.

truly. madly. deeply

salut!!!!

A darling friend and musician invited me to a screening of a documentary he had been a part of. The piece was spectacular. Scenes of Kenya drowned my heart and for the hour that the documentary played, I was in the womb of life itself.

Green. Lush. Alive.

After the documentary there was a cocktail. There is an impenetrable unease that chokes the air at cocktails.  

Strangers .  Awkward laughter.  Need to leave.

So we left. My friend, his cabby and an acquaintance I had been introduced to at the screening.  There was pleasant conversation in this new location. Familiar faces flashing smiles and a spiraling air of intoxicating laughter.

Music. Music. Music.

When I finally got home, my spirit was light. It felt like I had been soaked in life and come out new. I was refreshed at 5 o’clock in the morning.I watched a jealous sun outshine a modest moon. Dawn washed over my fears and my skin shivered in the ecstasy. In that time,I thought of the snake I had promised my new friend-formerly an acquaintance and snake collector- I would have wrapped around my neck by April. I imagined how brave he must be to have decided to move countries just so he can follow a dream. I thought about how rich his experiences looked when he painted his past. Only 24, travelled the world with no money and still chasing ideas . I wanted it.

Life. Courage. Experience.

That evening, settled in the same bed that shared in my fanciful thoughts, I opened an old copy of  Dickens’ Great Expectations.  There, a small hand written note that I had never seen fell. In it, I found a precious thought to sleep to.

‘Be brave. Take risks. Nothing can substitute experience’

Paulo Coelho.