She Always Comes to Class Five Minutes Late

But I already dream—
My practiced way of escaping the low,
Oppressive drone of Professor Monotone—
My thoughts in thoughtless habit drift overseas…
               
               To Malmö, Sweden, where Isabella (my Pebbles)
               Takes the ferry (click) to Copenhagen.
               From Kastrüp airport—click, click—
               My Pebbles flies to me for a visit.
               But that was months ago?
               click. Click. Click.

In waves of persuasion, hypnotizing clicks,
Encroaching sounds struck by heels approaching from the hall,
Echo, resound and surround,
Blend into my reverie
                                  Softly, at first,
Then louder and now confused with the tired dream
Of Isabella and the past.

Stirred by the confusion,
Dusty neurons awaken with excitement of possible
                                                                                Release,
Shrug off the torpor of a moment ago,
Ready their potential in an excited state
Which a moment before with lazy habit
I vainly had struggled to induce.
                                                   Reverence—
For the holy neon arcs of slender legs,¹
Stretched nylon, and patterned skirt
Imagined slowly walking frame by frame,
Arcing from synapse to synapse—returns,
Latent desires conduct their charges through channels
Reenergized.

And now flows through the blood this feeling:
From the seconds ticking with every heel clicking,
To the static swishing of skirt to nylon sticking,
To the insistent pounding of my heart’s frenetic
Beating—
                 The volume of the whole,
The long, wide and deep ocean,
The chasm between us,
Barely holds the dimensions of this feeling
Rushing in…
                      Isabella, are you there?

I discharge with one limp pulse.
The doorknob turns. The door opens.
The face appearing in the doorway overwhelms.
                                                                            Everything
Drowns in white noise…

The door opens to my future? Closes on my past?
I return you, Isabella, to a speck on a map
I was by lazy habit drifting towards:
Malmö, Sweden.
And this opening and closing of doors has ended again,
The door inert, ajar.

¹"Is This Where You Live", The Church. "Fishnet, girlish the red ones spark/Holy arcs tracked in the dark".

12/14/92 rev. 1/15/92 rev. 5/26/98