PAT Still Life #2 (501)

-- wide brown eyes like touch transubstantiated,
a finger tangential across a sandy chin
sliding credulously down an overcoat lapel;
brown hair color of fall,
an autumn cataract over a plastic ledge
blue like electricity --
where is the neck? the ears?
they hide but lurk predatory like memory --

-- youth's frivolity on stage
trading ringtones and gossip in voices umodulated,
an ostentatious display of indifference
to the high school refugees
whose memories falter, failing
to recall childhood's cadence,
its contrapuntal march from the old(er),
a colloquy of studied slouches and sighs --

-- unfolding herself from her seat
a jacknife opening to its task
eyes returning home up lapel over chin
and away forward leaving a wake
of glowing warmth in a rippling V --
all in tan like Iffucan of Azcan in caftan
(Stevens' verse circling in rehearsal
for the lap it will turn all evening having now begun)
hair swinging like an earthquake
and a parting glance like a prod of inscrutable origin
or intent --

-- the teens giggle and mock and maunder gum popping
while minutiae aggregate and gather
to spill out on this page --

[revised, 1/27/05, 12:25PM]