UENESS I COULD EAT FOREVER
Jeffrey A. White
Copyright 2013 by Jeffrey A. White
Cover image by Jeffrey A. White/Pont des Arts, Paris, 2012
Table of Contents
SURFACES
LIKE A DREAM
THE CRICKET'S SONG
WHEN
A BLUENESS I COULD EAT FOREVER
BEAUTY
TOGETHER
ONLY A DREAM
BIG CITY
OUR LOVE
LOOK BACK
WHAT DO I REMEMBER
BEES
LOVING HER
COLD LIGHT
WAVES
MY MIND'S EYE
FEELINGS
OLD MAN'S DREAMS
EARLY MORNING FEAST
MY PATH
A COLLECTOR OF SHOES
READING POETRY
BETWEEN TWO HEARTS
WHEN SHE COULDN'T GET UP
I DREAM MY POEMS
HUMANITY
A FEW MINUTES
LOVE STORY
ROBBED
THIN, WISPY CLOUDS
HOW IS YOUR SOUP?
LATE WINTER
STORIES
MAYBE EVEN ENJOY A SUNSET?
LAND OF TURTLES
AN UNKNOWN ARTIST
DIFFERENCE
SOMETIMES
SURFACES
As I am stirring sugar into my latte,
I look around the crowded outdoor caf?.
I don't know anyone.
To me, these strangers are surfaces,
flat images,
hollow projections and noise,
but nothing more.
I find the last empty table,
a green metallic skin,
spotless,
rolled perfectly flat and thin,
smooth and cold
and glistening like polished glass
in the early morning sun.
A man and his two-year-old daughter are sitting
at the table next to me.
He lowers his latte to touch the lip of her juice drink.
She raises her juice to meet his latte.
As the father says "Salud," the father and daughter
nod their heads in unison.
With a glance to the father,
I say, "When I was in my twenties,
I rarely noticed children.
Then, in my late forties, I guess I hit grandpa age.
I started noticing children everywhere.
Children warm my heart?You are truly blessed."
The father smiles at me
and says, "Thank you."
And then, he looks back at his daughter
with a loving smile.
LIKE A DREAM
It all seems like a dream, now.
Gray, old men ambling about a bookstore
in the old Jewish quarter of Paris.
As everything is suddenly soaked a dark stain,
we duck inside a door stoop.
I gently pull you closer
and look into your eyes,
azure pools inviting me to sink
into their sensuous depths.
Time slows as everything revolves around us
and planets, stars and constellations
slowly turn like clockwork,
as we dream our love,
our universe - together.
As darkness drains from the early morning sky,
I pull you up to my chest and whisper,
"Do you remember when we were caught in the rain in Paris?"
You squeeze my hand.
It all seems like a dream, now.
One love, one dream, one universe,
with only you and me,
together,
dreaming our love forever.
THE CRICKET'S SONG
I heard a rapid alternation of notes,
a vibrating staccato of an ancient instrument,
nearly as old as nature herself,
a cricket singing
in my garden last night,
the first time this year.
When turning my garden's soil,
I often uncover crickets,
curmudgeons that scramble to find solitude
and cover from the light,
but I rarely hear their
ancient song 'till near
summer's end.
Although the wind is now lofting the branches
and rustling the leaves,
the evening sun
still warms my face.
And my garden still blooms full
with pink-papered hollyhocks
and blue, green spikes of lavender,
and roses,
bright pinks and yellows,
all glowing from sunshine-swelled canes,
and zinnias,
rainbow-shingled orbs,
and more.
And yet, I am already dreading
the coming of fall,
all dressed in small rags
of red, yellow, and orange.
I know that my summer garden
is nearing its end,
as hailed by the cricket's song.
WHEN
When I hear birds serenading the gift of a new day,
When I watch the trees sway like fields of wheat
and feel a warm wind brush my face,
When I see clouds slowly drift and turn
like millstones,
I know happiness.
When I hear the sweetest notes grace your lips
and reveal your generous smile,
When I gently pull you closer and inhale your perfume,
which harks back wonderful memories,
When I gaze into your eyes and gently kiss your crimson lips,
When you are resting your head on my chest
and we feel intimately connected,
as if your beating heart is my heart, your body is my body,
and our souls are intermingled,
I know love.
A BLUENESS I COULD EAT FOREVER
As our Milky Way galaxy
slowly pinwheels
across the darkness
towards some
unknown
destination?
I stop to breathe and look around
at the plastered houses
with their rainbow hues
and swaying trees
and the immense
blue sky,
a blueness
I could eat forever.
And, then
(for no particular reason)
I look down at the paved path,
gray liquid stone long since set
and worn rough.
Inside a crack,
I spot a pinprick of color:
a tiny,
yellow,
flower
with waxen petals,
all blooming from green-cupped leaves,
which are slowly
encroaching upon
the stony grayness.
BEAUTY
Just outside my bay window,
my neighbor sheared back a camellia
with pink flowers,
pretend stars.
For the first time from my living room couch,
I could watch wispy white clouds
slowly drift and turn
like leaves floating on a meandering stream.
How like a white cloud you are:
beautiful.
And yet, few notice you
unless you become wild
and dark.
Is beauty so common
that people don't see it
unless it is extraordinary,
except for me,
when I wake in the morning,
brush the hair from your eyes,
hold your hands
and drink coffee with you?
TOGETHER
As I round the corner, I see a crouching derelict
with a sagging spine, blistered gray skin,
bandaged eyes
and fallen gutters.
Strewn across the front yard are weedy thickets,
mounds of toothed vines,
and sun-bleached bones of forgotten furniture.
It has been a long time since this old house was alive
with the music of children and adults
talking, laughing, singing and loving,
all making lives together.
ONLY A DREAM
As I brush the hair from her eyes
and gently kiss her cheek,
I whisper,
"And what of you, my love?"
and white dresses?
Are you dreaming of lying on cool grass on a warm summer night
while the heavens slowly turn like a millstone?
Are you dreaming of white sailboats skimming across the Nile
like flocks of white doves,
my beautiful queen?
Sleep well, my love.
And be sure to dream a place for me,
somewhere between the darkness and the white fires,
a place where I can cherish you in my arms,
as we dream our love, our universe,
into being.
Sleep well, my love,
for without you,
I am only a dream.
BIG CITY
Glass-skinned swords,
soaring out of blackness,
propped against the sky,
edges glistening in the sun,
all casting razor edge shadows
and deep canyons,
from which masked strangers
flow, join and separate,
write their stories
and play their roles.
OUR LOVE
Stretching beyond the horizon,
the sea, a lustrous blue fabric,
draws tight and taut
over the face of the world,
tinged orange at its far edges
by a low-hanging sun,
a glowing tangerine
cut wide open.
Squeezing against the sand,
foamy waves endlessly surge, retreat
and weave irregular edgings
of land and sea.
Small, stilted birds waltz the surf,
grasses gently sway in a light air
and one-legged seagulls sleep like flags
stuck in the sand.
We splash and play in the surf,
laugh and giggle.
Drops of saltwater drip down her face
and roll over the curves of her breasts.
Our hands touch,
and we slide into each other's arms,
into the grasses now beating to a sea breeze,
now beating to our hearts,
into the grasses, where screeching seagulls
are now lunging into clear air.
LOOK BACK
Several years ago,
I visited a friend who had built a country cottage,
surrounded by a vast rolling garden of sunlit meadows,
rainbow blooms, shaded glens,
streams and ponds.
It was impossible to see
the entire garden all at once.
The only way to imagine the wholeness of the garden
was to walk through it,
follow the winding path
and view the garden from different perspectives.
Invariably, secrets revealed themselves
around each bend.
And sometimes, I chose to step off the winding path
and follow the contours of the land
and my heart.
In my youth, I imaged my entire life
planned out before