Urns for the ashes of tired hearts

by Allie Rowbottom | 2008

Urns for the ashes of tired hearts. Disappointed hopes.

I write because I can't live otherwise.

I draw the sponge lengthwise over the countertop and watch as it inflates, one crater-like receptacle at a time, filling with the wetness I left when I washed that lettuce. Red leaf. Dirty.

Outside a choir of birds are singing down the sun, one shade of orange at a time until it blends into the dark horizon and disappears.

We can't see how much we've lost until we see how much we had.

How I've come to love the water. And this bug filled garden. This dirty, speckled lettuce. These three ripe tomatoes.

Carole Maso: "the desire of the novel to be a poem. The desire of the girl to be a horse. The desire of the poem to be an essay. The essay's desire, it's reach towards fiction. And the obvious erotics of this."

The black woman beside me in a sleeveless blouse. The white roots woven into her arms, marking the places where her skin has stretched to hold her, all of her, in.

Coca cola in glass bottles, clinking on glass topped tables. This is how I remember Europe.

That feeling, lodged beneath my ribcage, seated beneath my heart, that momentary rising. Excited and desirous. The moment before you're inside me. Before the food filled spoon fill hits my mouth.

Moving fast to a slow song
This train set to speeding against a background of melancholy
And music
Autumn in the air.

To give a rushed kiss goodbye. To know you'll kiss again soon. Assuredly.

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