In Scarlet Black through I (for Jade)
By: W Jude Aher
Water breaking into sand, taking prints who are hands, who are feet crossing. The sun leans to meet the edge of time in line, weighting between night and day. Whispers like seagulls in dream flight churn movement as a solid silence between a woman and the lights of color. Clothes are bound tight against her nakedness, on the side of a smile never there. Pictures in care stare from across her tired fingers. Something lingers, always something lingers. Her hair is tangled and knotted, torn by the weight, in freedom the wind, relentless with its taking of mirror screams. Her eyes are closed as a means not to see, yet she always finds more to forsake against herself. A man like flakes of skin, turns or begins still again, a drifting of sand past the end. But what ever ends or only across the gates of death. Night, black warm night as a blanket covering nothing ever slowly. Or the like of sleep who laughs at feet nervous and awake. Who took what was taken, what was never there.
A sand castle from a days delight across in the movement of a child’s unearthly might, crumbles as stone loosing hard against the loneliness of but empty wind or rain, sand storms murdering without stain. The echoes in the rubble only remain, till grains start counting grains. Laughter across the edge of tears, but no face. And yet a trace as rope binds a woman just to herself, no more?
Eyes blink and a mind thinks, while decay is the refuse of another day, yet to find that it has come and past. The voids colored by the paint of rocks, somehow find equal time to the demands of rhyme. The arrogance of a child who knew never enough real to hold tears, are years in seconds , waiting, always waiting on a river’s edge, on nothingness, worded and carved as a face. Here who is never a place, holds memory for more then real.
And echoes of silence owning without hands to command anything or anywhere. She turned and wasn't there. Yet remained with the sight of a man in child form frightened against the mirror of night. So, something is wrong- or easier nothing is right. A door closes behind her or a house, the illusion of home. The yearning to roam. The yearning for somewhere.
Winter and night held by a thin layer of snow still white. Footsteps alone follow her relentlessly. She is trying to decide on who to be, The absurdity of rotation about a void is never seen. Or a tree covered in earth and white, beautiful in the sameness; no demands between fingers and sky, mirrors who need never try and why. A circle grows on the strength of the philosophical Opposite. Cry woman cry for of the moment you dream to die on a voice spelled loud on the reflection of nothingness, drawn so clear, ever so clear that something seems as illusion against fear.
A funny face is a picture in snow, which may be seen only in the never of that sight. A child’s swing is a thought of rust somewhere below that frozen water in beauty. The shadow of a man crossing a street near by reminds her to hide, and so she walks faster, leaving the snow behind. And death decides, but the scream is too quiet to redeem itself.
She lies that night next to her man, wondering how close to herself dares she really to be. Annoyed or angry at the demands she places on she. Does this writer find the story beginning or ending, and where. Is anywhere the only absolute of someone? A tired poet once passed on a thought against the dream of hearing this woman from his shadow adrift upon streets in night.
I stand here, in an Earth’s Dark,
with
a Black Sun
Screaming its storms of Light
in Black through I
It seems,
that I can,
but;
forever just begin ,
on my reach through
my body’s echo through eternity -
Of seventeen years, but few ever questioned her age, or openly least of all she. A writers dream so young of owning the world, in all the magic that nights of color hold. Her marching time of parents as schooling rhymes were but the finds of fact, with all the edges and all that they lacked. A scream of freedom, that might the world believe. Of wars into death dare we ever accept or ever believe. A child in a man’s form, dreaming and forever torn standing faceless in a world where she hopes to belong by not. Was something forgotten or never known.
New York of Greenwich Village, the city of magic nights for all the young dreamers who are but in love against their need, of but all the delights of Freedom. And a dim street is to be a fairy tale in modern tongue. She walks past the crowded retreats alone, roaming. A man rotting on the edge of a corner doesn't believe in the real of her moment, and in so doesn't exist. She resists without thought, that just she is wrought. Is something bought and yet never spoken into. Jazz crawls through an aging door, and she stops for a moment of more. But voices ignore and so she continues on. Or still. A searching ignored behind a moment’s fill.
Who dares believes in the movement of time behind the musical rhyme of lights living low. A table of wood and bricks deluding themselves through a thin coating of white. Strings play soft against words who sing hard. A chord and then silence. A drink is the dance of reflections as it slows the mind. She cherishes her find, on Bleeker street in a cafe, she belongs - in eternal moments between seconds longs.
He stops by her table to greet her, maybe more to meet her. His hair is long behind hard skin and tired eyes. His face. A trace of dreams still trying, a trace of a child crying. She never finished deciding before she smiled, so quiet inside. She turned to accept the ride of someone not bound and tied by the lines of a child's world. Talk was born on social movements and the burnt flesh of freedom’s ride. And of war stories where it seemed everyone died, but for this man, whose duty was to watch. A song of Dylan seems to join them during their refrain, on silent sips of sweet drinks. She is a woman, for a man believes in her. And the silly stains of her body’s rains, in fear lives somewhere off but no way near. The more clouded the more clear she thinks to become. While the night moves slowly on. A man leading as if he was born for tomorrow.
Again the street, and not alone this time. Magic still the holding a find of movement. She was a warrior finally walking with voices who hold a need for talking.
Upstairs she watches him from across a room, a single light bleeds soft in Chinese magic, behind a hand painted lamp shade. And here, there is nothing to evade. The floor is soft as he lays her down into the sewing of his side in flesh. His fingers but touch her skin, no sweat craving to begin. She leans in while behind shadows played dim turn as clouds on a child’s might of dream. His fingers search out her flesh, till her clothes are owned by yesterdays store. Easy in motion he asks her for more. Touching her till he's entering her; He is loving her in dream light against the floor. A woman turns to belief locked free behind a door.
Nights march by as days, as she comes to him more. Weeks turn into months while they dance on wooden floors. She follows him into movements for Peace or action against the war, her country, her children deserve more.
She was early and didn't think to knock at his door. Filled with special wants she streamed across the floor. His rooms were quiet and still, where was he, and her smile slowed down. And metal against metal was sound behind the bathroom door. She thought to wait but what need for she to revere ancient customs. Stopped not even shocked yet she couldn't move any more. His face was turned away as his arm yearned for and then into a needle. The air was harsh, a nervous white. His rush of a drug’s ecstasy in flight, ran slow and long, and she never moving almost recoiled from his song. Then he finally faced her. He tried to erase any trace of this place he might have been. With guilt against guilt, to love is a sin. But she needed this love. No words were those he spoke. They moved and made love, slept together till they woke. And stroking him in his sleep she moved closer between her hands and feet.
She didn't watch time or the change in the lines of her private touch. Not so private any more. He cried and slowly died, behind the frightened craving of her eyes. If he beat her or not, he still
defeated her and never forgot. She stayed in that stop, till one day he was but a tired body, till ever late one night he died. Lifeless in her arms she left him still warm and soft there against a Chinese light. Then tired and lonely she curled in a fetus stance, till her mind became but Chinese white and nothing.
How long ago, but no. She sits wrapped by silk cloth, in the shadows of lamps and night. Drawing rivers and hands without too much light. Watching songs of woman in pain always trying hard once again. And there across windows ran snow which could be rain. The soft refrain before another day, yet to be played. Stay something tells her, stay. And contrast delivers her strength, with demands, growing demands and her fading away. But the question wanders, which way, which way.
He was simple a man maybe, or a face. And her fingers closed with his against the push of a lingering trace, wanting to stand or ever not. And everything could be forgotten except for in the rooms of shadows and drifting sight. So she came to lie naked at his side, caring not to linger or to hide. And nothing is left to confide or to no one. And when he rode her like skin she yearned for him and nothing more. Flashes always waited till she was alone and near to the floor. And she walked in two rooms never needing doors. Weeks became months and she simply moved on.
Is a Poet a man, but only if he stands close for too long. She met him, and he never offered her his name. And as a Jester might dance so he spoke with words the same. And as weeks moved into months, he offered the illusion that he was there. But for real he did, in a poet’s way, care. Giving poems to one side or another, between his stare. And demanding that only one woman could stand there. While she ran and hid and sometimes cried. And who sighed when he wouldn't compare.
And as time drew distance between her and the things who were no longer there, and as someone touched her in moments with demands of repair, she met dreams up off the floor. She dreamed of a poet and ignored her man. Separations with no where to stand, and wanting an itch across the fines of her hand. He called her and she never came, he chased her and she never ran. She stood waiting for someone to lead her into the sand. Black sand in a dream, the poet is a man of earth and command. A child still waiting in a Bleeker Street cafe. And so he wrote her a poem before he wandered away.
"RIVER LAMP
ANGELS TINT THE WATER
CHINEESE
WHITE
/ MANHATTEN T TRAIN "
Dance , softly astir,
river,
cold and clean
drawing away
a Salmon jumps -
is he done with play -
Water sparkling rhythms,
end silently as he fights
to stay
Cold dreams ,
in a Mornings' Scream
just no watching ,
On his dead
struggle ,
now floating away...
A glance in a Woman's find -
Dressed for spring -
she sits,
Yes the Only
the Lonely night
Draped in shadows
a cross fallen
onto eternal waves
Blood dripping
through a quiet song
Wake me
Cool in White
light quiet across
Love -
quiet across
flesh - mesh shadows
streaming as the air
Drifting - simply there -
More then Care
More then Care,
/ Morning ; Rolls , on a
Manhattan Train -
Black Wind -
Conjured
till the shadows give light –
cross down the oars –
Wash new Blood on the
stores –
Lying on silent tears -
Waiting
for the waves to shake you -
Waiting;
for the shakes to Break you –
Shadow Wind Streams -
Taking her always air
Taking, ... her never air
And she watched him go, stopped there within a door.
She stared at the front door and the footprints walking away past her. She stared at the front door, almost till it stared back.
He knew she was turning away and was almost frightened to say anything. Her back was naked and long and he thought of it as warm. Or was it he, little matter if you don't heed the thought. But he touched her anyway, turning her back against the sheets.
And she sighed silently in retreat. How easy to ignore retreat, he kissed her and then made love to? or on her. Warm and tired he fell into sleep, forgetting or remembering, it is all the same. And she turned again
to a dream which no longer had a name.
And snow began to fall again across her eyes. How long has it been since she has really cried, yes but not long enough. So she sat down letting cracks of light face the void of her back. Fingers almost numb, but that uselessly tries to turn her off the track. She wants someone who she wanted once. But who. Or this man who waits patiently for the anything of she. Her demands call, or his, what has she given away?
When has she ever walked, alone or free. Silly thoughts on who to be. Why, it was so easy, always so easy. A snow flake lands on hand, stands for a moment and then melts, was it ever there or puddles in the air. What remembers. Standing on a corner of concrete into concrete, where was she, she couldn't remember. Streets into streets, with names in the shape of anywhere so easily forgotten. Where do I live, which way, her mind couldn't connect. Alone in the mist of a hard steel void, with creeping thoughts of: I belong somewhere; I belong somewhere! She would race, and stop, turn, then walk over and over in circles in her lost lines of thread and drifting whys. Fear across her tries till finally in scattered relief she recognized her place and remembered belief.
With snow outside the window, just begining, he forced her to say that she wanted to go. Which way, but she couldn't dare to know. Something real was drawing her through something real remembered. Would someone remember her and take her or forsake her. Does it matter, or is it she, who dares to conceive of herself. But the name she gave him; he stands believing so hard that it is, was more then a name. He cries and won't mention good-byes. Does she remember names or Does she listen to stains screaming the Dreams of clouds; or much more. No Door any more...
Caught, and too many somewheres and no one single belief. A body straining is demanding relief. The moment is brief yet forever, as she can't move she must. And cars almost sliding by fast in the street, could they really kill a body and more. And she sits in falling snow watching hard steel slide by. Black dreams and blood screams searches for some decision or some why! The weight of soft and Real when it lingers somewhere; when a woman lingers somewhere near to herself...