SHADOW DANCE, CIRCLE DANCE

W.Jude Aher

 

Dark evening road, carrying space away, slowly away. Her eyes, no loss for tears wander the shadows of a yet to rise evening moon. Water my years, oh sweet dusk. Brown hair that shades to black within the fall of every night, every night of her thirty year life. Hard English stone walls still to the passing of movement gone, for moments and gone. But as with too much of everything else, so carries lingering on.

Bone drawn fingers walk circles through loose forest dirt, unwalked or is it untalked. Her breath, oh how sometimes the sound in the silence of her self talk walks to the edge of a moments hard laughter. And the laughter itself, how long across her eyes has it been. Childhood scenes are the but for the quiet of ever-more, and so her breath subsides, resides in the wind calls cross and pentangle that marks gold and thin lines across her neck. And its nakedness, how to the whenever, so free?

An evenings flesh to love still reminds, and defines that which is it worth the memory, echoing for her flesh but also for no memory time. Circles in the earth. Earth of sanded black dirt and leaves crying sweetly to their death. Circles in the Sanded earth. But what ever is left over for birth.

Breath at ease, and a turn of her mouth that always pleases her, rides out from the water that is in her blood. Down from her shoulder she carries an aged leather bag, lines of memory fading into lines of whose craft. Her fingers reluctantly break the motion of circles.

return to her minds volition. They return to cause and effect. They return to touch and the motions that reject. Cause and effect? How do I wonder, in these wanderings of mine between dusk and night. A touch of wet where between her clothed thighs, and fingers to hands that still again ignore. Childless but how ever, never so barren.

A covered wooden cup to be placed there before her and centered in her previous unmentioned circle, drawn. And then a moment to stop. To stop to motion? And I for time of what lack of. Searching the lines undrawn, searching for a tear once lost but never fallen. A call from between her lips. Alone word ancient in its it's form. A word never worn. Quiet from eye to finger. And then a moment to breathing the spoken void. Form, be careful, just the barest of moments to form.

The tear, sweet nameless tear. A tear to form, to the lines forming to slow there within her circle, a circle still hers. From eye to flesh. From flesh to finger palm free. And from finger to wind, a mountains long silent wind to circle free, growing to be.

The forgetting. Back behind her shoulder she moves her hair, smooth in its tangles worn. The remembering and motion turned. An ancient line to be drawn where within the circle, touching never yet the lines of its close. As to where were, as to where is, does she as asks she, lose again to all the times of before. A motion new but never held to stop. it is the earth where beneath her feet naked not yet, who to truth or reality that remembers. Whispering, and only echoes whispering back to her.

And still back to her leather bag. This time as still to the others. Growth or death falling, closer to away? Her lips divide between a song sung through wood and strings, and/ an olden woman’s tries. A leaf walks to wind to the edge of her circle. A leaf in its death talk divides between earth and sky till it is gone. A leaf in its shadow to remind, to rewind the beginnings. An olden woman’s sighs, formless seem to form still behind open lips, behind flesh and real. An olden woman’s sighs, and still back to her leather bag. A Hawaiian frozen earth and fire stone, as glass and black to skin and palm. A stone still in warm after many frozen winters and Northern turning skies. Moments, just to moments.

Staring into the stone, again as in the many of befores she remembers to the hold, to the hold of either of time itself, so self indulgent, or to the hold of herself. And she chooses as before not to remember. So, that olden woman must smile through her so drawn lips from behind whiten hair. But for a moment she almost remembers, to the whitened or almost whitened hair. To lift the stone out to an evening’s first sighted sight to light, another word in its ancientness sung, yes, now sung. Held till starlight is light in reflection, and no exception. Held for her eyes to pace from still beat into pulse. From memory to void into motion chained by memory and flesh practice. And now the woman eyeless and earthed in form only, carries the stone down into the circle.

One more time, back into her leather bag. Held in her lap timed to the stillness of her legs now open and crossed, feet naked as please. And as to later she will always again wonder when was it that she removed her boots, untied and removed. Small bag of flesh and death in ash. And into this bag she reaches her fingers, two fingers only.

She reaches to a form olden woman drawn. An image and a pinch of ash.

Circle dance;

Blue eyes, foreign blue eyes;

Star in light - longing and alien sight

memory return to shadow as flesh

till nothing is at rest,

Blue eyes, foreign blue eyes, shade to the wind

earth called wind, shadow as flesh to shadow

Her fingers move to exactly nine inches above the circle. Her fingers in the touch of her whole body, in the touch of its feel of its motion to love. They dance the circle dance till fingers and circle become one. And ash touches wind to ride into the circle. And her fingers still.

It is shadow that wakes her eyes, to remind of tries or is it why. This that white-haired olden woman never explained. Hawaiian stone and starlight cast to shadow in the sudden night, with dusk no longer lingering on. Circle dance and shadow light. Form or illusion, earth and deaden leaves are cool to the naked flesh of her feet, naked or free? What dances in or as shadow. Almost an olden man, shadow to blue. Is a moment still a moment when time stands on a smaller mountain of northern night. When the live crack of a living tree's branch, is sound and sound still.

The leather strap a sweet touch hard across her chest, touching barely touching lines to a cross warmth and easy pain to her left breast. She must be x away from this mountains height before sunlight rises. Shadow and earthen path, shadow and earthen path. For in sunlight we remember and nothing lasts. Ancient walks on forgotten paths. And a touch of wet, of a man. Lost or loving man.

Her leather bag is thrown and almost forgotten in the back seat of her old VW bug. Oh car, how many miles have we run together. Smiles on her lips and memories in her eyes to the low roar of its small engine and an old Pentangle tape in music.

The light shifts, a shade crossing upon itself imperceptibly. Sunlight waves. My fingers chance in nervous self-consideration upon the shaft of the brush. Color waits, between the wall of canvas and the consideration behind my eyes. There is nothing to believe and nothing to try, just movements. Just movements.

Color or lines, mix deep into my perceptual considerations. Frozen in a late autumn afternoon. A bead of sweat moves down the back of my neck, calling towards my attention, whispering something in the silence that holds

The color dipped brush rides slowly my hand to the palette of color grazing stillness on my lap before me.

The shift moves and light against shadow becomes real, touching the first edges of my canvas. Lines immobile are moved in an early dusk’s first breath. And I lean on my stool. That loving old stool. Stained almost black. An Ancient Northern forest, an unnamed forest. No wind blows there. But color seems to shift and move across the stationary lines of trees, earth and motionless breaths unseen.

I stand from my stool, its soft surface now a loss of line in an afternoon shadow. Blood seems to hold itself a moment in its rage, long physical, long echo, living rage within my body. I step out into what question of reality. Do I really move. I almost wonder. Trying to feel, balance of palette-and color upon my lap. as I stand only trees and air, colored in depth and soft blue, seem to notice. The silence walks across my throat before any movement of larynx can motion to itself. Is it evening yet, there is someone yet to meet, but the silence catches that thought in its own unsounded laughter. I walk across an earth almost alive in its giving in to my

feet and weight. Looking to the edges of a small field into a mist curtain in color of trees.

I must stop, though I don't. I seem to hear a sound in wait, there behind what edge of rock- silver and black; behind what tree, so thin and ever so full in the depth it hides. Is there a little blue, why blue, man dancing voiceless laughter as I walk lost from control Edgings of fear, but soft and nameless, stir beneath my shirt or skin, as a private wind. Soft and almost too warm in its motionlessness.

A leaf, green-blue breaks off to my left, behind what wall of color my sight can't reach. It's been minutes, or hours. I seem within feet of the trees edges. My eyes move from side to side and yet are fixed on a single spot, a single tree. I reach into the sky, a sky weighted

and low, of gray and blue black, of clouds circling in a motionless rage. The laughter is almost clear as the nearer I approach that single tree.

My arms carrying my fingers stretch out for my body, reaching for a curve in the air and color. Reaching carefully in nothing, for what reason.

This fear, this place - neither is real? Where do I walk, when walking I can not be doing. I can still feel the touch of over mixed colors on my lap, as almost the echo of blood pumping. Red, deep and rich. What freedom cries in the places below my skins' surface. So real and close. Do I reach back. Back and across what in this longing silence.

Fear laughs from behind, urging the walking still. Fear in a blue voice? Behind or within what tree across my vision. Walking further still towards this walled world just inches away. My fingers reach out past my arms in blue air, or is it gray. Blue fading to green where the edges of my eyes can just see. Somewhere else to be, far and away from where reach my fingers and blue laughter.

A shadow crosses my vision and the color before me. And a tree or is it a tree is just within my palms reach. My touch rages in a lack movement. And fear like black in a great blue depth numbs the further find of fingertips. As if a grave waits, a grave unknown for ages. A waiting still.

And I stop as another shadow shift draws a line across the growing amber darkness before me. I can almost see just behind this tree, or wall of trees. My feet, suddenly noticed seem to hurt where far away. still, is it death I reach for just moments away, so still and alive. Is it death or blood? Blue or gray tinted hands before me pull farther into the edge turning, trying to pull me to where my body has and when tied itself to what earth below me. All in feet. I try to look down but where is down. The whole universe seems only alive there in the now slow glow about or within my hands.

I reach, try and reach deeper, as gray is carries darker into blue.

And another shadow seems to shift, aside? Light as an echo from behind me.

No ! But who called this black burning reach, reaching out to me, quickly.

No! In rage and long blue laughter. Light for a moment and empty edges

seem to fall in from the sides. I reach into, but a world more in echo then silence; more in distance then in feel or grasp.

There is minute point of blood beneath the skin of my first finger. As I hold it before me I stare momentarily fixated. Evening light shadows the canvass before me, and I can almost hear the paint, now colorless in a dusk of shadows upon my lap. I remember the pain, almost

in my fingers or tired arms yearn pain and age into the other of my seated body. The canvas unfinished, belongs to the shadows, for the moment as I try to remember. Another daydream. Was it, when? Too compulsive?

But art sweet art. I rage so tired and yet. What window and drifting sunset over concrete buildings and green still summer trees. I could almost call out and fly in the wind. Walking in its talk with trees and leaves.

So tired. In every cell I rage in the sweetness of my awareness. A child, city blocks away whispers to its doll in loving hate. Whispering words I seem almost to hear. I look to a small plastic clock, listening to its seconds crash echo upon echo.

Whose hand wanders over the facing of my apartment door? A hand I almost touch from within myself. And dark gold in a seemingly empty design upon its fingers? My loving stool still beneath me, as I turn my head towards a darkening hall, down to its ending corner. Waiting for the echo to knock. Remembering only a knock, seemingly poised in mid-flight. Waiting?

Waiting for reality to come and find me. Should I move. With a clock still on my eyes edge, I know that a night in the city is emerging from its dusk in shadows. Should I move.

Enough of painting, I am hours beyond my limit. And I drop the palette-f drying to death onto the floor. A sound swallowed as a knock, flesh on wood hits the air of the hall.

And again.

Darkness, always darkness, soft it its silence of echoes. He sits alone on a woven cloth mat. Its sharp knotting of color lost in shadows of almost singular form. A small night-light is the only. His hair is lost in rage and held in a tied knot, held to his naked back by skin and sweat. An aged deck of Tarot cards lie face down and unshuffled in front of him, half in, half out of the rooms dim light and dimmer shadow.

His eyes are lined and tired. They are held to that sleepless wearing that holds one a wander into the ever depths of night. Hard sweet night.

A wooden slatted shade barely moves in its window form and lost streetlight. Its touch in the room is as the touch of his own slow breath, forgotten in the recesses of his body’s flesh.

What dream, How easy? What less or more then human. Does a man ever really strive to both believe and receive.

Again, the cards seem to remain lost below my own skin. How easy I read others, and when, yet still I venture to draw lines for my own future. Lines still never clear. 2mxxtxx So strong sometimes do I know the paths of truth and rage, and yet. I do. I draw in color as I paint, for is it truth I wander, or reality. Or is it but the long delusions of color and art. Will I ever know, will I.

His hands reach out from his cross legged lap, to rest above the cards. As try to read a closed book, so strain his fingers. Striving for tomorrow or is it just today, all the forgotten thoughts of today.

His eyes are motionless in their fixation across the pile of cards. They are lost in a shadow dance, motion unmarked. Something stirs where in this two room Manhattan apartment. Something stirs behind what white, shadow dark white walls, matching pace with the slow falling beads of sweat.

What forgotten painting is waiting, I have yet to finish, what forgotten song, in poetry I've yet to ever write.

One room and but feet away a palette of drying color lies on the floor,

He looks up from his cards or is it the call of his fingers in an almost hold that calls out moments to his eyes. His eyes, lost, so lost in the shadow dance. Wordless are the lines being drawn this, and again this night.

Where across from him, she lies. As his eyes move, his flesh remembers its own. She lies in full shadow on a thin mattress, uncovered and unclothed. Shadow is full, but on a bare touch of light from the other room in reflection. Sight is to memories forgotten. Thin to gold chain, thin as the lines of her neck and chest. Pentangle in circle hold, her sweet magic sweet touch. He comes again to taste her in the air suddenly so physical. No dreams are behind what is thought or wrought of her. Slow lost breaths move within her across the room.

Between a fetal hold and a woman’s dream her hand holds time softly across the bare opening of her legs, all shadow still.

Again a larger night, interruption upon interruption, a silk webbing of light and magic free to silver. I yearn to cry or love once again. I yearn for the time loss of sex as of canvass and color. But the voice of my cards still wait. Time is the cross of time. Only mine. How often do I question. My fingers are the opening of my eyes. Long into the night, ah! shadow night.

His tongue barely moves within his closed mouth, seeing in the touch of life beneath smooth gravity fall of her breasts and face unseen. (Do even I know what I mean.)

The cards almost shift - in, deep in the back of motion. And again his eyes return to the call of fingers on that controlled fall of the tarot. Cards unshuffled as hidden within themselves and shadow.

And his voice, where within, again searches with the walking walls of silence. And of sight. Always of sight. Comes almost a thought, but stays held to other times. Times where only the present holds and call both on yesterday and tomorrow.

Silence sweet silence. Speak with me of time broken and free. Cards speak within!

i~

She stands in the morning light as it falls through his south eastern windows. White walls are growing white. A sheet still warm with a nights sleep or is the rage of their flesh lingering. Oh, younger man, sleep your lost sleep. A touch in chill almost wind is in feel upon her naked and wet sweet wet thighs. Her eyes, in their green or sharp brown wander between the sunlit air and his painting. In its own wetness still and, ah, longing northern mountain dance. Circle dance? A whisper of shadow, a whisper of blue there in his depth of Autumn lost trees. Or is it a stone wall she doesn't quite see somewhere behind.

Coffee and the sounds of Van Morrison, are the quiet of this slow morning, she watches his almost thin body in its breath to sleep. Tasting what smells in the air. Her eyes linger, too long, these sweet ages of mornings fallen. Her eyes jump almost of their own accord to her previous days clothes in their fallen pile. Between her lips smile unspoken and her eyes sudden rage of loss?, she comes to the sight, in leather strap, as if falling in its stillness.

Don't wake yet, oh, younger man. Coffee almost done, record in turn. She brushes her hair smooth dark brown hair back behind her shoulders. She brushes as she moves to the leather strap, and its line carved to worn bag. Her fingers within easily barely disturbing the clothing’s nest or rest. Bag untouched, smaller bag from within held tightly within her left hand, as on the moment are the dark sands through her memories.

Walking on cool naked feet to the other room, her fingers untie easily the bag within her still left hand. Knife in her right hand. The knife touches just barely the color blue still undried and stirs to a circle form. An ancient word to form. A pinch from exactly nine inches above her moving circle moving in blue. An ancient word to form.

Coffee on her lips, loving the feel of her body stretched long to his worn wooden floor. Something less and something more. And still he doesn't stir and her next breath is almost as silence to laughter crossing her lips. Lips to his, lips to hers. Her old VW bug yellow in the suns light waiting almost as a sound on hold downstairs. Another day and she can return home. Lonely, loving home, of wood and carved wood.

Knowing the canvas is finished, and almost afraid to return to his other room for another view. Compulsive sight. Is it day or night?, staring across the room not seeing the cold cup of tea, in his clutched hands before him. Staring in a fixed point, in the air, in his memory. Staring in a shadow, as if she still lied to their sleep across the room. Sheets crumpled cast whose lines to the shadow in where his smell could still or almost taste her flesh to flavor, remembered in their forgotten time together. A map folded neatly to the side. A circle to the north in ink, blue ink. He could almost pull his eyes to the smile on his lips as he remembered her insistence on blue.

Blue on his brushes touch. But no! A painting lives only past memory. Lives where between shadow and reality. He tries to see within the sheets. Their wrinkles are lines into yesterday. Seemingly almost here, never yet and almost here.

He steadies his legs and there notices their nakedness, cool across the worn wooden floor. No echo, where stands an only man./ Ah! should have been a poet. No one to see, no rage but to be free? As a poet would that silent woman have been able to love me. Too much stage holding me to canvas. Can I even remember the too few words she spoke to me? Hard in her loving warm, always warm as to within her I entered. Almost feeling a morning hardness and her upon. It's time to leave these rooms. Ten days. Too long this time, my legs they feel too old.

He walks to break the shadow feel, (or real) and switches a 20th century light on.

Dylan’s, Like a rollin’ stone, tries to break into the slower cracked wall of sound, while water, old to ice runs down his back cold to tightened butt, warmer from legs to feet. "Ain't it hard when you discover that, he wasn't really where it's at" Cold to ice. And he laughs over the shower and music sound./ Still Crazy man. Too much paint on the lids of your eyes,/ Seeing trees beyond the trees and color up their knotted knees. He turns to face the water while his feet reach

over to turn up the hot, while his hands reach for the soap, hard sand soap. Blue paint on his hands, time to clean his skin. And over, naked in canvas, naked in skin, to please his or his childhood’s compulsive needs. No tarot cards today. And a sudden wind pounds against windows.

No! Time to leave this apartment. Don't want to remain totally insane. Only to the edge, man Mr. Man.

His hair loose and still wet down his back, caught to itself and the raking of a cool wind. He walks slowly up the hill. Black concrete falls hard upon his barely covered feet, feet in shoes too large and too old. Whose shoes were they, found thrown away, how long ago. Was it three months or four? He walks up the hill into the deep wooded park,at least to his visual sense. The urge is to turn his head, to turn back to glimpse the edge of his apartments window, as a wind tickles upon his shoulder and deeper within. Green and winter naked trees begin to close into his world, and the urge.

He stops at the top of the hill, just before the turn of the path. He stops to listen, or to hope - that he won't turn, that he will let go of the painting drying, slowly drying where behind hip. He turns in part. He turns his head and upper body to glance. For freedom? On large apartment building it takes a few spent seconds to pick out two windows. Just a glance to see if still there the painting dries. / As if I could really see./ Dark window. Almost. Dark. A candle light flickers in shadow almost in dark to blue. Blinking. / But no, I left lights off./ And now easily he turns to the trees. Their wind and taste waiting still for him; to walk and to run. To burn away the rage now complete, somewhere, but where behind him? Yes, in his darkened windows on a canvas no longer his.

And into the forest of wooden trees and black concrete paths he walks.

In the fallen night and times echoes, his legs walk slowly past the cross of paths under lightless rock broken street lamps. Time accompanies him, much unused. Silence holds his thoughts. And what dreams might spark to the moment, flicker only and. And just as quickly they fall to death. Slow coming, slow he comes to rest within. Searching to empty and begin. Long shadows pace him, shadows that dance no dance all to the growing smile on his lips.

Another shadow I've passed often before - Man park, loving man park - off from our concrete sea.

Again he comes to a small clearing leading out to such a small overlook, overlooking that long night shadow black river.

Funny that I never really look out the rivers run, out to the sea that lives down earth bends unseen. Always north. North for the wind and living silence. North up that long run.

He sits on stone, long cold stone, raised out from the earth. Listening to the occasional car traveling by, below and unseen on the ending of that northen highway. The stars dance and only a few are seen as most live a lost rhyme behind a city’s larger light shadow.

As if from a living tree branch, a broken sound seems to crash the air. So loud and gone before, just barely before the sound reaches him. His eyes, from their pools of shadow, turn with his head back over his left shoulder, looking. And of course, no one is there to be seen. This late at night, he has never been disturbed. Still there is always a first time. Earth city rhyme. But as the shadows remain in their fall, he easily begins to lose what broken call? He looks one more time and then turns back to the river.

The river?, something lingers in the edge of his eyes. Something? Something blue. The scene that passes between river and him, the scene is of one last look back at his apartments darkened windows.

Please self, I came here to leave you alone, to say my good-byes. Has it ever worked before.

Movement sits in shaped quiet trees behind him. Eyes shadow to sight through him and river. Small blue hands begin to form on small blue hands. Growth and slow until blue meets shadow meets eyes. Memory begins. He hums a tune, sharp melodies unpaced, unpaced against flesh and blood flow. A tune whispers through his lips, a tune he doesn't remember even as the tune is formed. His fingers draw slow circles on stone, circles that seem to remain and leave stone unmarked. Small blue man?, as if shadow worn drifts in place, the fingers running circles in black earthen dirt. Circle dance.

The smell of her herb tea drifts its taste and silence all through her large roomed studio cabin, wooden walls as floors to ceiling breathe with the taste. Fire plays from within a black iron stove centered within her room. And through its open grill she watches its dance. Her breath slows to whisper its pace, lacing her blood now timed in its flow. Behind the stove and the shadows chanced from its fired flow rests a guitar echoes in the lines of her life. Within, a motionless shadow lies its rest. And her eyes, slow to rich green see through the between of fire dance to drift. Long sweet string and wind sound.

From guitar, easy guitar back again till again in the fire.

Ax marks turn to upon themselves as the fire burns and calluses

from upon her hands. An olden woman almost to form there within to beyond where fire is motion, sharp to easy strides.

Slow to whisper, a herbal tea touches from flesh to blood, slow to whisper. TAKIN TOTE TEEL YON YAPPIE, takin tote teel yon yappie, TAKIN TOTE TEEL YON YAPPIE, takin tote teel yon yappie. Slow to whisper. Fourteen years grown, and sometime easy time known. Long brown hair, tied and tied again lies lost to memory down her back, covered easily in a slightly large cotton shirt. Pacific winds stage the air with light warmth and movement. Jungle trees in large leafed form close the day below her, and as if in response open the mountains above her. The child is tired but happy. She got away again, away and alone, where they know not to find her. The voices never reach this high. It’s her jungle, her sky. The sun falls more to color then light and her fingers can dance to such shadows that might be cast. Shadows that hold her minds eye and her fingers, shadows that rise, seem able to last, for now and forever. Alone until that day of fourteen years grown, monthed within her blood soaked time, still again. Yes, I'm a woman and from now on it will be always again. So, she tries to hold the feel close and closer to her. But the feel remains just a bloody feel.

She never saw from where that olden woman came, but there beside her she was to be. Short in height and low in stature. She was reaching into an old worn leather bag when Jatin first noticed her. Jatin , she would always have a little extra love for her parents because of that name. How many of her friends play with names other then their own, searching, searching always playing. The woman is just there, so what can Jatin say. Her eyes slightly depressed at having her place lost. Is this growing old, no more places for escape and alone. But easily all the same, a pacific game, easily all the same.

The woman pulls from her leather bag a smaller bag. She holds it open as out to Jatin. Chew on some, it will help the pain. Ah yes, the cramps. They are the worst part of being a woman. She feels her child like breasts to touch against her cotton shirt, if only she could have remained the child without such growing and stains. Still holding her smaller bag out to Jatin, she repeats herself. Please, chew on some, it will help the pain. Jatin really looks to her now and her white-haired fall. Mountain witch, all the kids tell stories of such people. But she always thought they were just that, stories. Her mother had told her that there were probably a few still up in the mountains living their lonely lives as they did in her child hoods days, but even she hadn't heard anyone who has seen one in many years. And here I meet one. Me Jatin. Her loneliness suddenly not entirely invaded, but instead a private specialness seems added to the child’s eyes. But I don't know you. Are you a mountain witch. How easy is it to talk to this woman, a woman I don't know. It was never easy before. Not a witch my child, just an old woman living alone with her roots her trees and her memories of days long gone. Please, chew on some, it will really help. Here, I will chew on some first. First taking away her left hand and brushing back her white hair over her left shoulder, and then reaching into the smaller bag she places a small bunch of brown and leaf form into her mouth, behind yellow teeth and chews

Chewing, Jatin leans back against an older tree feeling its knots across her back and listening. Such beautiful stories this woman tells. And as suddenly the woman is standing alone in the sun now untouched by the trees filtering sight casting a shadow how much longer and almost blue. Jatin you've been staring at the sun too long, our beautiful hard pacific sun. And she has no intention of telling anyone even her mother of this woman, she is part of her private place. Watching her walk stiffly away up the mountain. And up the mountain to where. Her own private place? Can we keep these places all our lives. Do I really have to be like my mother and her friends everyone living together and all the time. Maybe? Maybe? And while stretching out legs hard knee legs, still chewing the pain is gone, not just easier gone, sweet gone. Looking up, expecting to see still that olden woman, the woman is gone. If it wasn't for the wetted roots between her teeth she would barely have remembered her. And yet.

Fire and black iron her fingers move round and round. Takin tote yon yappie...

In the sharp morning light, the lines were always so much more clear in this light when working out the signs of live models. He sat on his stool, feet naked and pacing just barely on a rung just off the morning cool floor. Sharp morning light draws the shadow across her skin, finely tight. She tried not to shiver, while not glancing to his window open a crack. Her nipples hard and her eyes self aware. Seventeen and still too young to pray without her nakedness. Blond to light hair lies to a knot above her head, to the balance of her ii legs tight to each the other. But his eyes see so closely, not to see. What long fine fingers, they rush unwatched across and still again, his open pad to white. If her mother, or even her boy friend were to know. Selling what wasn't yet his?/ But No: She wasn't selling nothing.

With each line Chris looked back to her, and each time her hold held the barest of motion./ If only, I can capture that, as if in time speed there a child to woman grows./ Lines into lines on shaded edges, charcoal black. His oil easel white sheet covered, stands face to wall, silence to wall? Only a day, it's too soon. But still his model and silence fills the room. He barely remembers calling her last night, barely remembers how her name got onto his modeling list. He was sitting above the river, waiting for the loss and the freedom. Waiting to let go. What. No! I should be getting stoned, sleeping late. I’ll never paint this early again. And why this girl. How young is she? Youth is a bore. / His fingers move to the beat of his eyes searching her movement, searching her motionless. / Well, maybe there is something. The pubic

hair, but not enough? Draw man, Draw!

Fire and black iron, her fingers move round and round. Takin tote teel yon yappie. Jatin walks the path slowly, a part in her self looking always looking to the jungles' edge and how much further for what plants her olden woman requests, always requests. Has it been three years now? And still no one but she knows. What smile shifts from silence onto her hard drawn lips. Stopping she walks off the path and into the jungle. Her body quickly finds the root, dug up and into her pouch. Even some of her friends wear such a similar pouch, leaning her private stage into a fad. And her olden woman simply says that its but an easier place to hide reality, there within the illusion of reality. Pouch closed and back onto the path again. Oh, sun hard sun. Her face turning a barest of inclines to the sky, no you must ignore the try. And whose words call to her again but again. What is she losing to keep this fourteen year old world in private in still its form. Would she still be walking this path alone, or with a boy friend, as with all her many friends. But her olden woman says to wait, her time is not yet. Of course or would her mother agree?

Funny how she always knew when to turn off the path, there were really no markings and just the barest of openings in the jungle. Stopping behind that now familiar small wooden cabin, looking so lost and out of place out here in the jungle. Oak, where did that woman find oak out here in the jungle. By now I'm sure that she could never have had the money to have brought it to the island. If the cabin didn't look so new, I would have been sure she had found it and squatted all how many years ago? Answers, and always to again, You'll know in time. By now she doubted it. But still, there was so much to learn and somehow too much to hold her from returning. Would she have to choose between Jon and her secret woman. He's been pushing. And somehow also it was her own body that pushed. Waiting, but waiting for what. Just a crazy old woman.

Stopping just behind the cabin. Jatin decides, now or was it really earlier to first sneak to the cabin’s one window opening. Glassless she hoped the shutters weren't closed. Careful to the now silence of each step. Which isn't as hard as she would like to believe, as a few feet of hard packed earth completely surround the cabin. Good, it’s open. That woman always forgets to tie the shutter back, well it's her shutter. Yes, mother. Now leave me alone..

Jatin’s hands slowly back the shutter back against the cabins outer wall. Her fingers now in a child’s secret crawl from shutter to window edge. Her eyes follow quietly behind. And the very familiar room, is still there, its largeness and its warmth. Still, and always the same. But having gone to all this trouble, she finds some strange enjoyment in spying on this woman’s place. From door to beds, still and never a change. But. Her skin prickles, a breeze touches her neck moving touchless through her hair. Afternoon shadows, its got to be. Yes, this is silly, but Jatin can not yet pull herself to turn away. Did I notice the door ajar. Sunlight cuts through the room, as water in a deep jungle fall. And behind this fall what shadows to blue. To Blue. She had never noticed anything blue in this olden woman’s cabin before. But no, its the shadows. Her back feels cramped. I'll have to move soon, if she finds me like this, will she finally chase me away after all these years. Have I really been learning enough, just a silly child far too much in love with her hiding place?

Something sees me from the shadows? You're being silly child. From the shadows? Blue eyes, and how clearly I see them, but who is? fingers want me? But why am I scared, isn't it just a shadow dance. Ah, the shadow dance, circle chance. Is this what I've been, what the olden woman’s been waiting for? You'll have to a wait for the shadows to dance. Jatin’s breath, unnoticed quickens its pace while there seemingly in space what looks to be almost what, a small blue man begins to pace round and round in a circle. Facing away and back, blue eyes staring into hers, not seeing her here beyond the window. Not seeing her? Is that the woman’s body through which he walks, but how much faster. A hand down hard to her shoulder, palm sweat moves with her skin. Sweat touching. Who? And the room is but a room light and shadows still. Jatin turns then, and suddenly. She turns to see no hand, with her shoulder still wet while her blouse somehow dry. Touching it, but how can it be dry? Come in my child, it seems you're early this day. Yes early, and maybe not.

Fire and black iron, her fingers move round and round. Takin tote teel yon yappie...

Why is she to be here in this field. This painting was to be finished. This is not how I work. The Queen of Wands? What is it doing on the floor. It should be back in the deck. Have to remember to replace it.

An early afternoon shadow crosses his painting, now again unfinished. Holding the stools seat in his hands he stares onto his painting, again in place for light. For morning light, but it's gone, and the shadows they fall, falling.

Why did I plan this last sitting so late? She must be here soon. When did I ask her to come. Silent laughter, but no!

Chris strokes his hair.

Did I wash it last night, the night before? Touching,. No. It doesn't feel too dirty. I should brush it. Why am I afraid of scaring this child away? She's just a model.

Her lines are too drawn for his taste; just as he is sure she is still a virgin simply by looking at her nakedness now lying just to the edge of an animal sleep there in his painting. Still unfinished.

But just one more sitting and - Fuck it, if it's not done!

And still she knocks so quietly.

For some reason, not touching her, he talks her into position.

It must be her age. Am I getting old.

Trying to see her for a moment, he almost remembers a time when? How old was he, sixteen? Is that why he looks to older women? The girl didn't seem to really care. No one but her knew. And her tears held their silence, as her smile seemed to thank him all the same.

What had she wanted, outlines through her pubic hair, that was all that was left to capture. And the eyes, those walking looking away eyes. Paint to brush. Why a dab of.. blue, her eyes aren't blue, are they. Blond hair and green - yes green eyes. Blue - no too dark, a colder shade - more death - yes remember the anatomy class - the skin, dead and bare to blue – cold.

Was I remembering? And now the blood, how easy to steal just a drop, their bodies never noticing the extra slice of her nails when lost in their lust and loving. Yes woman, you brought me to it well. Sweet witches spell. Still alone in my clearing. Fingers in their circles. Blood from lips to circle. and an ancient word whispered. Blood to circle to stone. Stone she feels so well there across the room in her old worn leather bag. Blood to circle to stone. The iron stove fire glows low, and the shadows slow their dance. The timing feels almost too perfect this time.

Fire and black iron, her fingers hold still in the circle. Takin tote teel yon yappie...

No?, yes just another touch.

He turns back to hold the time, time in this shadowed room, color of her skin, just a touch to thin the hair. Black with the barest of blue, her pubic hair.

Funny for a girl so blonde. Where was it that I found her name. She should have been at least shaded to light brown. But is it her, or is it the shadows. How can I paint in these shadows? Nevermind. Just this touch. And there.

Will she want to see it, of course, they all do. They're here for the money, though could I resist.

She stands in the robe he has for her to use between sitting times, standing back against the wall where the ceiling light allows the best view. /Did I tell her to stand there? Funny, I can't remember./ Looking once again before turning the painting for her to see, painting to she. / No? How young is she really, they are never the same as I paint. Behave body. Behave?

Funny, her eyes don't change their character as I turn the painting for her to see. And her hands, so still before, now turn again the Queen of Wands. Upright then reversed, as she stares into my painting.

It's so quiet, I'm almost asleep. Did I really look that way. / The girl walks closer to either the painting or me. Eyes, green eyes never wavering from their stance while she talks. How easily she talks now that she can see the painting. What has she really thought as she posed and naked to me, for me?/ Are my eyes blue, the almost closed. I love the blue eyes./ Eyes, green eyes never wavering from then stance while she talks.

Chris walks to the other room to play some music and, yes

some tea.

Now where is the tea? No, I finished that box. Now where? Yes, she left some the other night. I can't remember if I liked it, but I guess tea is tea. Hot water, a the music, yes I need the music. Just the edge of a glance, he turns to the other room. Is she closer to the painting, and eyes still locked. The robe now loose at the waist. An open thigh, a light brush of hair, almost blond? The music, he always feels just slightly uncomfortable watching someone looking at his paintings. It's done, this time it done, I'll probably have to give it away to be sure.

Funny, he just put on the record and he suddenly can't remember their name, his name? Doesn’t matter, the tea is ready. Is she still staring at the painting?

He turns too quickly to find her just behind him. Don't know if you'll like the tea, someone gave it to me. Taking her tea she walks still in his robe, hasn't changed yet, to the one chair in the room. Funny, her face still holds its child’s, or to him, form. But her legs as she turns and the robe paces her, what muscles could he have missed during all that time. Taking his tea he almost paces the room but sees her watching his, waiting?, for her money, for his?, he sits down on his mat.

I'm glad it doesn't look too much like me. I'm really not as young as you painted me, and I do have breasts you know. He sips his tea and then looks up at her. Looking to the folds of his robe on her, didn't I make her breasts. Taking another sip of tea, rich to hot, he tries to remember, to visualize the painting. A picture before eyes, to visualize learned how long ago. And he can barely see her, though he knew that he didn't paint it that way, his visualization seems to loose her in the shadows. Did I paint her grown breasts. Trees, Nothern forest trees, are they shadowed more then he remembered. Should he go into the other room and look. But instead he looks back to her, trying to see her in the painting. Wanting to remove her robe, questioning what he would see?

Another sip of tea. Has she finished hers, does she want

another cup. Is she rising to leave, have I paid her yet? No, she is just and still sitting there, waiting for me? To answer?

Rising from between iron stove and shadow circle, Jatin walks to her floor and feathered mattress across the room. Lost in the now sharper lines of the circle dance. And the olden woman’s white-haired face lingering through memory to smile for a moment. Lying down, while taking her Hawaiian smooth stone from the leather bag to lie with her. Ah, memory and perfection. In star-light remembered and blue eyes to rise? To rise for the circle walk.

And between moments she still and just remembers, easing the unspoken frustration. With each time you'll remember a little more.

Blue for time, blue for distance, see Universe, you can surprise me so little. Blue for time, blue for distance. Star-light for motion, star-light for a world.

Seed dream shadow dance, almost time again that you'll call to me. you'll call to me as I call to you. Quiet woman child, a few more moments for the seed to feed out, and we'll wait together in silence to find its own birthing time, time for time, and waiting to find, this time, oh so perfect universe, so perfect shadow play, from child to child. Such sweet tears in your eyes, but you'll never remember, even when you're placed into the depths of your earth, so much the more closer to me. To me. To whom am I would you care to see. Just here or somewhere long before you had a time to be. Mother to mother to mother before.

Did he doze? Is he, but his eyes are so heavy. Open, just open. Has he been watching her, but he really can't remember. Or a dream. Still robed in his robe. How old is that robe, funny he can again almost remember that time how long ago. Was he wearing that robe then, in his still too thin body. Was he wearing the robe when he rose from her, blood on the tip of his Lounge, entering her slowly, and slowly again. Entering her slowly, and slowly again till the slow pain in her eyes wasn't just pain anymore. And the pain in her eyes?

Has he been watching her, her thin lines without motion, her thighs closed in the stillness of her stance. Asleep, no her eyes, what touch of blue. How could he not notice that barest of in her green eyes? Yes her green eyes. Eyes open wide but seeing where. And tears, slow falling tears from eyes down into the edge, the edge and easily lost into her long blond hair curling round and round. The tears on her nakedness, is there pain in her eyes. Yes, but maybe not. Her lips, is that just the edge of a smile. But is there pain in her eyes?

Slow as if from somewhere within Jatin, does a shadow cross from within her. Her dress lies open down the front, while her thighs lie one in touch upon the other. And there is just the barest of smiles on her lips. A touch of blue to shadow in eyes that rise. Almost but never to form, rises what small blue man, vague as his circle walk begins. Vague as his circle walk continues. Slowly almost to dance a circle walk around as through her. Around her pelvic hair, shadow hair to stone. Stone and circle hedge, ancient and celtic ledge. A dance to the circle of northern blood. By rote; Takin tote teel yon yappie...

The olden white-haired woman places her old leather bag between them. Jatin just waits. How long has she waited for, is it this moment. The child has waited, and how much easier was that then the waiting for the woman who is now. A woman still untouched and eighteen. Even her mother in one of her few quiet talks has found this waiting strange, unnatural. But of course her mother could never know that there is a reason. Is there a reason.

Holding out simply a stone, though a finely polished stone. The woman looking directly into her eyes holds out the stone above her leather bag. She holds out the stone out to, almost, to Jatin. A stone now seen, now explained. A stone given to her when she was eighteen, how long ago. A stone now being given to her, if she takes it. A stone grown from stone to liquid to stone out from the depths of the earth. From what Island volcano the woman wouldn't say. You'll learn from shadow of reality my child, never from reality. Looking into such of the stone Jatin of course wondered on how old could it really be, were you born with the birth of earth, or are you born in the whispers of tomorrow? Yes, Jatin, see from the stone, you see it is shadow prone.

Hands reaching, Hands reaching from hands to stone, smooth almost mirror stone, black shadow mirror. Don't worry if you forget the picture of my face, all that you've learned is in the shadow dance, is in the stone, is in the light. Remember Jatin, remember as I've shown you.

Lying there so alone, can she begin to feel his blueness within. Circle walk and barest of blue in the barest of eyes.

Her hair, yes it's yellow to blonde./ But again looking beside himself as she lies so still in her nakedness and his robe. Her hair seems to switch./ Is it brown now. But where are we, I have never dreamed of Was she fourteen?, so small in her breasts. Was it loving or lust. Just a child she was, wanting. Was it hers, no it was mine. But just a child wanting. The Blood, just a drop on my tongue, my tongue against my lips. And her eyes, between the pain and what smile to come, was there horror? What could I know to do. Was I to be a man so young. And yet, so sweet was the barest taste of her blood up from between her thighs to my tongue. But just the barest of tastes.

Reaching over to touch her breast, a breast that shouldn't yet be there. His tongue a line drawn down her skin. A memory, a taste, just below the skin, a pulse. Further down her body or deeper within. His fingers follow the line of his tongue - Touching, softly touching.

His finger nail plays the line. / Just a touch deeper, and a drop of blood, a taste, just a taste.

No. Just a touch, a small taste.

Her mouth doesn't cry, as his fingers brush out and around his tongue./ Just a pinch for blood. But the tears or is that pain in her eyes./ His fingers lie still a moment. Fingers as one, their brushes ride easily down her body.

Jatin stirs her pelvis the barest of motions, and the circle dance halts just the barest of moments.

From where does Chris seem to hear just the barest of a laughter. Almost an echo from another room, or from another time. A touch of horror, just a touch, never spoken of again. A touch, a tear of pain, his pain or pain. A look never to call from her eyes, but a look remembered. Why did he paint her without or with the barest of breasts?

Looking from himself to her, blonde hair before his eyes. Looking from grown breasts, down to her pelvis, to his hands, to his fingers. And her eyes what are they seeing. To his fingers moving to within her. But she is only seventeen, and I? I what?

Chris quietly removes his hands, his fingers. He rises quickly and stands above this younger model. Then he bends down with bloodless fingers to close his robe about her body. Her eyes suddenly tearless, close and slowly. Back across the room, still somewhat lost to a hard noticed silence. He still watches her. Her hands reaching around themselves while her body curls easily to itself. Her breathing a pulse of shadow, a pulse of shadow dance.

Jatin stirs in the morning light as it bends from window-pane to cross through her body. A Black Lava stone lies in its blackness beside her. An unwoken emptiness turns within her, turns within her without stone and mirror to cast the sunlight into shadow

And what within her might ever wonder where the shadow dance really begins?

Does Jatin remember, the olden woman’s white-haired face. That slight trace there behind the blue of her eyes, her brown blue eyes. That slight trace of flesh and light known.

 

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