Brandon Gene Petit's Blog
May 28, 2021
Poems I Hope You Pretend Are About You
Attention poetry lovers, fans of romance and erotica! New for Amazon Kindle! Free to borrow with Kindle Unlimited, $7.49 to buy.
Poems I Hope You Pretend Are About You
Poems I Hope You Pretend Are About You
October 11, 2017
The Owls Tonight
On this cool, spirit-heavy night, I lie awake in bed… freshly mourning the new death of an old friend who passed earlier that day.
In the subsiding exhaustion of the day’s events, I notice that the owls are out… though it’s been so long…
…breathing their frosty bellow-breaths into the cold void of unlit forest, their echoes answering back and forth as I intercept them from my bedroom window.
Only the mind can guess when silent wings glide to change their post, shifting the circumference of the haunting duet to better encircle me with the night’s mysticism by design.
Their sedately dissonant calls are the voices of ghosts, blessing the transition of souls through the doubtful halls of the dead and, eventually, into heaven… ushering them along in their own odd, bone-chilling way.
I have no reason to fear, though the night’s sounds are as unwelcoming as they are beautiful… it is merely the odd way of nature in the art of farewells; a primeval funeral not intended for the timid sentimentalities of man.
Besides, the more loved ones of mine leave this life, the less I fear the darkness of earthly night and the spirit world beyond.
Goodnight and Godspeed… as I leave the owls to lull me out of worldly fear, and finally into sleep.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
In the subsiding exhaustion of the day’s events, I notice that the owls are out… though it’s been so long…
…breathing their frosty bellow-breaths into the cold void of unlit forest, their echoes answering back and forth as I intercept them from my bedroom window.
Only the mind can guess when silent wings glide to change their post, shifting the circumference of the haunting duet to better encircle me with the night’s mysticism by design.
Their sedately dissonant calls are the voices of ghosts, blessing the transition of souls through the doubtful halls of the dead and, eventually, into heaven… ushering them along in their own odd, bone-chilling way.
I have no reason to fear, though the night’s sounds are as unwelcoming as they are beautiful… it is merely the odd way of nature in the art of farewells; a primeval funeral not intended for the timid sentimentalities of man.
Besides, the more loved ones of mine leave this life, the less I fear the darkness of earthly night and the spirit world beyond.
Goodnight and Godspeed… as I leave the owls to lull me out of worldly fear, and finally into sleep.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
August 2, 2016
We Meet At Last
We Meet At Last -
She sits in her rogue blue jeans across the couch, her knees up and her bare feet wedged affectionately underneath my leg… she wiggles her candy-painted toes when she laughs, and snugly pushes them a bit further when I say something charming to which she responds well. She poises a glass of red wine upon one of her knees, its base no doubt cold against the pale kneecap exposed through a tattered hole. Her frail black tank top suggests a casual, lounging elegance, the left shoulder strap having fallen lazily down her arm.
She remains daringly amused, occasionally resting her chin on her hand in a listening pose, even as I pretend to be clever and recite the humorous aspects of my past. Occasionally a playful sarcasm volleys back and forth between us, eventually followed by a sigh and her million dollar question: why did it take you so damn long to get that plane ticket?
She’s accusing me of being shy, when she says things of that nature.
When my failure to concoct a satisfyingly witty answer allows for a pause, she withdraws her toes and clumsily mounts her knees to initiate a prompting stare. “That painting… I love it; where did you get it?” I ask suddenly and point over to the corner of the room. “What painting?” she says with an adorable naivety… then, as soon as she turns her head, I descend into the crook of her shoulder for a taste of her skin and clasp her waist in a subtle ambush.
Her neck is maddeningly warm beneath my lips, but her hair is cool as I cup it gently with a hand behind her head. My fingertips part the ebony waterfall that is her lustrous mane, swimming through the silky strands as she tilts her head to the side and surrenders her balmy nape. Our lips soon find one another’s, entrancing themselves with each other’s motions as they glide wet and stifle our breaths… seemingly forever… and I taste the sticky residue of wine; the burgundy frost upon her lips. Then, at the end of some hiatus in time, her head retracts to reveal awestruck eyes and a mouth that hangs open in the aftermath of a kiss. The radial amber webs of each iris tick back and forth like two strikes of a pendulum as she studies my piercing blue gaze… cool wisps of her hair tickle my face as they flail in the breeze thrown by each pass of an electric fan. There is reflection, but not questioning… bewilderment, but not doubt. Silence serenades us like a tableside minstrel.
Without warning she clears her throat, climbs to her feet and leaves me there, unofficially excusing herself to the bedroom without so much as a word. I review my actions for any errors on my part, but before the air of confusion is allowed to linger I notice the sound of a jewelry box closing… followed by the near-subliminal rustling of garments being changed… and finally the faint, caressing sound of lotion being rubbed into wrists and hands. Expecting her to reenter a transformed woman, I turn to steal a final sip of wine and gather my senses… gazing down smugly into the glass.
She returns from the bedroom in an ebony gown, bringing with her a new aura of perfume that now floods the atmosphere of the den. With a ballroom elegance she drifts over to me like a Victorian era ghost, clasps my free hand in hers and removes the unfinished glass of wine from my other… the corner of her mouth cracks a spike of devilish smile in answer to the bewildered look on my face, all while she abandons the glass on the end table and leads me up and into the bedroom. A shallow pool of wine see-saws in the glass as we fade out of focus – out of sight – into the darkness of the room. There is the stench of a match as a candle is lit, then the desperate sound of more breath-haunted kisses.
…and thus night befalls our first day of love.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
www.bgpetit.com
She sits in her rogue blue jeans across the couch, her knees up and her bare feet wedged affectionately underneath my leg… she wiggles her candy-painted toes when she laughs, and snugly pushes them a bit further when I say something charming to which she responds well. She poises a glass of red wine upon one of her knees, its base no doubt cold against the pale kneecap exposed through a tattered hole. Her frail black tank top suggests a casual, lounging elegance, the left shoulder strap having fallen lazily down her arm.
She remains daringly amused, occasionally resting her chin on her hand in a listening pose, even as I pretend to be clever and recite the humorous aspects of my past. Occasionally a playful sarcasm volleys back and forth between us, eventually followed by a sigh and her million dollar question: why did it take you so damn long to get that plane ticket?
She’s accusing me of being shy, when she says things of that nature.
When my failure to concoct a satisfyingly witty answer allows for a pause, she withdraws her toes and clumsily mounts her knees to initiate a prompting stare. “That painting… I love it; where did you get it?” I ask suddenly and point over to the corner of the room. “What painting?” she says with an adorable naivety… then, as soon as she turns her head, I descend into the crook of her shoulder for a taste of her skin and clasp her waist in a subtle ambush.
Her neck is maddeningly warm beneath my lips, but her hair is cool as I cup it gently with a hand behind her head. My fingertips part the ebony waterfall that is her lustrous mane, swimming through the silky strands as she tilts her head to the side and surrenders her balmy nape. Our lips soon find one another’s, entrancing themselves with each other’s motions as they glide wet and stifle our breaths… seemingly forever… and I taste the sticky residue of wine; the burgundy frost upon her lips. Then, at the end of some hiatus in time, her head retracts to reveal awestruck eyes and a mouth that hangs open in the aftermath of a kiss. The radial amber webs of each iris tick back and forth like two strikes of a pendulum as she studies my piercing blue gaze… cool wisps of her hair tickle my face as they flail in the breeze thrown by each pass of an electric fan. There is reflection, but not questioning… bewilderment, but not doubt. Silence serenades us like a tableside minstrel.
Without warning she clears her throat, climbs to her feet and leaves me there, unofficially excusing herself to the bedroom without so much as a word. I review my actions for any errors on my part, but before the air of confusion is allowed to linger I notice the sound of a jewelry box closing… followed by the near-subliminal rustling of garments being changed… and finally the faint, caressing sound of lotion being rubbed into wrists and hands. Expecting her to reenter a transformed woman, I turn to steal a final sip of wine and gather my senses… gazing down smugly into the glass.
She returns from the bedroom in an ebony gown, bringing with her a new aura of perfume that now floods the atmosphere of the den. With a ballroom elegance she drifts over to me like a Victorian era ghost, clasps my free hand in hers and removes the unfinished glass of wine from my other… the corner of her mouth cracks a spike of devilish smile in answer to the bewildered look on my face, all while she abandons the glass on the end table and leads me up and into the bedroom. A shallow pool of wine see-saws in the glass as we fade out of focus – out of sight – into the darkness of the room. There is the stench of a match as a candle is lit, then the desperate sound of more breath-haunted kisses.
…and thus night befalls our first day of love.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
www.bgpetit.com
January 9, 2016
Whooooo Loves Dinosaurs? - A Coloring Book
While I normally write college-level poetry and prose, I recently took a side street in my interests and broke into the children's market with a children's coloring book, featuring comical cartoon dinosaurs for kids of all ages to color.
If you have kids that love dinos and/or love to color, or if you are an adult who likes to color in kids' coloring books rather than the convoluted "Adult" ones, head on over to Amazon and check this one out. Search Inside feature activated. At the time of writing this Goodreads does not have my front cover loaded so you have to click on the link to go to Amazon and see what it looks like.
Here's the link:
http://www.amazon.com/Whooooo-Loves-D...
If you have kids that love dinos and/or love to color, or if you are an adult who likes to color in kids' coloring books rather than the convoluted "Adult" ones, head on over to Amazon and check this one out. Search Inside feature activated. At the time of writing this Goodreads does not have my front cover loaded so you have to click on the link to go to Amazon and see what it looks like.
Here's the link:
http://www.amazon.com/Whooooo-Loves-D...
August 29, 2015
Redolence
Woman is a fate I bear too often… and the woman that most recently graced this now lonesome chamber, well, her presence is but a ghost here. She departed so suddenly and left me with trivial objects still resonating to her touch… baubles and trinkets, things that trouble me with her scent. She was a woman of a thousand perfumes; such sweet irony that mere blankets and pillows are now her essence.
Empty wine glasses clutter the table, their edges stamped with the residue of red lips. Small quarries of loose change spread about their feet, along with crumpled receipts, old magazines, and other needless items it is doubtful she will return for. I scan the room with sullen eyes in seek of some worthy bait… some object of value that may coax her to revisit this place at least once more. Instead I find only a ragged shirt of mine that she often borrowed to wear in her sleep… I crumple it to my nostrils and inhale the feminine fragrances of the angel body that once masqueraded in it.
Fragrance fumes from the candles she bought, a reminder that this place is cursed with the photonegative of her presence. The flickering light mocks me as it overtakes from where evening dims and the room transitions into amber shadows, the imprint of lips fading from those glistening wine glasses. The thorn in my fingertip serves as a punishment for taking her for granted, and the bead of blood that follows is surely the opposite of her tears. Her afterglow smells like memories, and candlelight, and lazy days in bed… but to my dismay it does not smell like forgiveness.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
Dreams in the Womb
www.bgpetit.com
Empty wine glasses clutter the table, their edges stamped with the residue of red lips. Small quarries of loose change spread about their feet, along with crumpled receipts, old magazines, and other needless items it is doubtful she will return for. I scan the room with sullen eyes in seek of some worthy bait… some object of value that may coax her to revisit this place at least once more. Instead I find only a ragged shirt of mine that she often borrowed to wear in her sleep… I crumple it to my nostrils and inhale the feminine fragrances of the angel body that once masqueraded in it.
Fragrance fumes from the candles she bought, a reminder that this place is cursed with the photonegative of her presence. The flickering light mocks me as it overtakes from where evening dims and the room transitions into amber shadows, the imprint of lips fading from those glistening wine glasses. The thorn in my fingertip serves as a punishment for taking her for granted, and the bead of blood that follows is surely the opposite of her tears. Her afterglow smells like memories, and candlelight, and lazy days in bed… but to my dismay it does not smell like forgiveness.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
Dreams in the Womb
www.bgpetit.com
July 5, 2015
The River Shannon
There still survives a folkish whim,
Through days upon the river dim;
Chiming to a faery clock,
And fishing boots upon the dock;
Maidens kneel to dip their pails,
Their Irish wisdom not to fail,
Where shepherds with their strays do tread…
Near Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
-
Where dolphins flirt with Irish isles,
Flashing boats sleek dolphin smiles,
And mermaids comb their hair of weeds;
Long, red strands of fiery deed;
And sure as Shannon nightly flows,
Every midnight lantern knows…
That mermaids go to lay their heads…
Near Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
-
A wistful girl patrols the ground,
Her back to fading organ sounds;
Still sporting morning sermon’s dress,
Restless in the wind’s duress;
Like waiting for a seaborne coach,
She lingers as the clouds approach,
And feeds the blackbirds tufts of bread…
Near Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
-
Perhaps there sat an ocean blue…
Years ago, we never knew...
Where sullied ‘neath a younger sun,
Feral creatures come and gone;
Their shadows left to Irish-kind,
A wand’ring child on shore to find…
Patient fossils eon-bred…
Near Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
-
Rainclouds loosen bounties free,
Vapors stolen from the sea;
Unlawful gifts unto the glade,
Where dangling toes and bobbers wade;
The gracious river greets the kiss,
Unmindful of the hail and hiss,
And thus the mystic rains are fed…
To Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
-
Where herons prod behind the haze,
Majestic with their soulless gaze;
The shoreline where a rogue proposed,
And children lost in thought supposed;
Engrossed in faint, cloud-counting dreams,
Pierced alone by seabird screams;
The mythos of the past undead…
Near Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
http://www.bgpetit.com
Dreams in the Womb
Through days upon the river dim;
Chiming to a faery clock,
And fishing boots upon the dock;
Maidens kneel to dip their pails,
Their Irish wisdom not to fail,
Where shepherds with their strays do tread…
Near Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
-
Where dolphins flirt with Irish isles,
Flashing boats sleek dolphin smiles,
And mermaids comb their hair of weeds;
Long, red strands of fiery deed;
And sure as Shannon nightly flows,
Every midnight lantern knows…
That mermaids go to lay their heads…
Near Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
-
A wistful girl patrols the ground,
Her back to fading organ sounds;
Still sporting morning sermon’s dress,
Restless in the wind’s duress;
Like waiting for a seaborne coach,
She lingers as the clouds approach,
And feeds the blackbirds tufts of bread…
Near Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
-
Perhaps there sat an ocean blue…
Years ago, we never knew...
Where sullied ‘neath a younger sun,
Feral creatures come and gone;
Their shadows left to Irish-kind,
A wand’ring child on shore to find…
Patient fossils eon-bred…
Near Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
-
Rainclouds loosen bounties free,
Vapors stolen from the sea;
Unlawful gifts unto the glade,
Where dangling toes and bobbers wade;
The gracious river greets the kiss,
Unmindful of the hail and hiss,
And thus the mystic rains are fed…
To Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
-
Where herons prod behind the haze,
Majestic with their soulless gaze;
The shoreline where a rogue proposed,
And children lost in thought supposed;
Engrossed in faint, cloud-counting dreams,
Pierced alone by seabird screams;
The mythos of the past undead…
Near Shannon’s lovely riverbed.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
http://www.bgpetit.com
Dreams in the Womb
June 27, 2015
An Ode to Outlaws in Love
Shoulder-blades glistening with desert sweat… White tank-top rippling against her breasts in the hot, sandy breeze… Hawks circling overhead in an otherwise empty azure sky… She returns from the general store with a sultry walk and the sun glowing in her black shades, her hips swiveling in the cradle of tight, tattered jeans. Her newfound partner in crime tosses the duffel bag of recently counted cash back into the open window of his Trans Am, his grasp now awaiting the frigid, stinging sweat of an ice-cold beer.
Their hips collide as he takes her in one arm and the beer in the other, tossing the bottle back with eyes shut tight as he gulps the golden brew. He then hoists the woman up onto the hood of the dusty Trans Am with his tattooed arms and gazes up into her devilish laughing eyes… The madness of love and the audacity of youth had taken them this far, and a border tavern’s nightmare had become their getaway dream that they would not let die so easily nor so soon.
They smile into each other’s fiery eyes as they play out their version of a wedding altar stare, perhaps a fleeting premonition of a refugee future in Vegas. His barbarian hands fall to her waist, where his thumbs fumble with the black waistband of her thong peering above her jeans. Then, as if responding to some ghostly, half-heard sirens in the distance, she slides off the hood and they climb back into the low-seated car in the dust… her slender boot the last thing seen touching the ground before it is pulled in and the passenger door is shut.
The sun descends into a pool of flaming phoenix rite, and the desert horizon dances with prisms of heat expunged of any colors but red and gold. Soon the rash of a sky will calm into shades of soothing magenta coolant, jeweled with tiny stars that slyly leak their whereabouts one by one. With a grinding whirr the Trans Am exits in a cloud of torrid dust, the shrinking red eyes of tail-lights splitting amidst the heat mirage before disappearing between cacti silhouettes that are left to greet the night alone.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
Dreams in the Womb
http://www.bgpetit.com
Their hips collide as he takes her in one arm and the beer in the other, tossing the bottle back with eyes shut tight as he gulps the golden brew. He then hoists the woman up onto the hood of the dusty Trans Am with his tattooed arms and gazes up into her devilish laughing eyes… The madness of love and the audacity of youth had taken them this far, and a border tavern’s nightmare had become their getaway dream that they would not let die so easily nor so soon.
They smile into each other’s fiery eyes as they play out their version of a wedding altar stare, perhaps a fleeting premonition of a refugee future in Vegas. His barbarian hands fall to her waist, where his thumbs fumble with the black waistband of her thong peering above her jeans. Then, as if responding to some ghostly, half-heard sirens in the distance, she slides off the hood and they climb back into the low-seated car in the dust… her slender boot the last thing seen touching the ground before it is pulled in and the passenger door is shut.
The sun descends into a pool of flaming phoenix rite, and the desert horizon dances with prisms of heat expunged of any colors but red and gold. Soon the rash of a sky will calm into shades of soothing magenta coolant, jeweled with tiny stars that slyly leak their whereabouts one by one. With a grinding whirr the Trans Am exits in a cloud of torrid dust, the shrinking red eyes of tail-lights splitting amidst the heat mirage before disappearing between cacti silhouettes that are left to greet the night alone.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
Dreams in the Womb
http://www.bgpetit.com
June 23, 2015
Hello Again (prose-poem)
As strange luck would have it, destiny crossed threads and tied another winding loop, and pictures of you flooded into my world once more. It’s been a long time since I’ve felt my heart alive inside my chest… and even longer since the true meaning of bittersweet shoved an aching religion into that heart like a spear. Even as I crack a smile I mourn for the frail woman-child I had all but forgotten in those memorable webs… You are now a grown woman with children at your feet, husband at your side, wedding pictures mounted in your hall and fresh flowers gifted on your desk at work in the morning.
As for the life we knew, we left our love in those quiet corners… the forgotten hearths that we had made, now sleeping in oak tree shadows between the clouds of dream. The amorous tales of humble streets are now hushed… reduced to a mumble of quiet remembrance, yet ready to unveil the barbs of memory when I seek to pry in the early hours. In wake of our love’s decline, I often wondered… did you fall asleep so many nights with the tears drying on your face? But it is no matter, for I know those tears have now given way to wedding tears… and mother tears… and as the sound of traffic pierces my wistful daydream, I awaken to feel the hardness of my heart and the dryness of my sobered eyes.
There is, I fear, a sadistic side of me that hopes to have awakened old feelings within you… but that jealous man will fail. I will fail to resurrect a heartache and put it back together. No, not even one last time. My fate is not yours, for our karmic deeds are apart and so are our newfound hearts. For years we have been nestled in the lives we’ve made for ourselves, and I would be a fool to think you could be torn from destiny’s arms at this matured point in time. I am doomed to play my part in the cycle of poetic justice… me a martyr, and you a victor… for I am nothing more than your eccentric, wayward ex-lover, left to wander in a lost realm of poetry and mysticism. Though we are now worlds apart I send my blessing across the ocean… across the sea of static that keeps me from trespassing into your life with the husk of a forgotten love.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
read this and more in:
Dreams in the Womb -
Print and Kindle versions available.
Also appears in:
15 Unrequited Odes -
only 99 cents for Kindle.
Website: http://www.bgpetit.com
As for the life we knew, we left our love in those quiet corners… the forgotten hearths that we had made, now sleeping in oak tree shadows between the clouds of dream. The amorous tales of humble streets are now hushed… reduced to a mumble of quiet remembrance, yet ready to unveil the barbs of memory when I seek to pry in the early hours. In wake of our love’s decline, I often wondered… did you fall asleep so many nights with the tears drying on your face? But it is no matter, for I know those tears have now given way to wedding tears… and mother tears… and as the sound of traffic pierces my wistful daydream, I awaken to feel the hardness of my heart and the dryness of my sobered eyes.
There is, I fear, a sadistic side of me that hopes to have awakened old feelings within you… but that jealous man will fail. I will fail to resurrect a heartache and put it back together. No, not even one last time. My fate is not yours, for our karmic deeds are apart and so are our newfound hearts. For years we have been nestled in the lives we’ve made for ourselves, and I would be a fool to think you could be torn from destiny’s arms at this matured point in time. I am doomed to play my part in the cycle of poetic justice… me a martyr, and you a victor… for I am nothing more than your eccentric, wayward ex-lover, left to wander in a lost realm of poetry and mysticism. Though we are now worlds apart I send my blessing across the ocean… across the sea of static that keeps me from trespassing into your life with the husk of a forgotten love.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
read this and more in:
Dreams in the Womb -
Print and Kindle versions available.
Also appears in:
15 Unrequited Odes -
only 99 cents for Kindle.Website: http://www.bgpetit.com
June 22, 2015
15 Unrequited Odes
A tribute to the elusive muse, 15 Unrequited Odes is a short digital volume that features 15 lovelorn pieces of poetic prose from the moonstruck mind of Brandon Gene Petit. This exclusive eBook contains some of the best, most wantonly romantic pieces from two of Petit's larger bodies of work, Dreams in the Womb & Ab Antiquo, Ab Aeterno. If you are a lover of poetic description but want something more to sink your teeth into than quick little rhymes, then sample these prose-poems with a heavy heart, a dreaming mind, and perhaps a glass of wine.
Only 99 cents for Kindle! Read it on your Kindle or iPad. FREE with Kindle Unlimited.
"I wanted to make a short 'teaser' eBook that would act as an introductory gateway to my writing, so that people could sample my work easily if they weren't yet sure about purchasing my larger bodies of work." - BGP
Only 99 cents for Kindle! Read it on your Kindle or iPad. FREE with Kindle Unlimited.
"I wanted to make a short 'teaser' eBook that would act as an introductory gateway to my writing, so that people could sample my work easily if they weren't yet sure about purchasing my larger bodies of work." - BGP
She Rules the Room (prose-poem)
The walls are sultry red with mouldings and curtains of rustic gold… intrusive potted ferns impede the path from room to room, occasionally brushing unheeded against a coat-tail or a creamy feminine thigh. The tables are white-clothed and abundant, the ambience most exclusive… like a forbidden glimpse of a sultan’s den. A stiff tiger greets newcomers at the door, a taxidermist’s boastful contribution to a room of ice sculptures and prize-winning cakes. Beautiful long-haired women sit cross-legged at the bar, each one stroking their hair and bobbing their foot in a cross-weave sandaled heel as a man leans there to woo her. I observe with a practiced stealth, a sort of faux aloofness… for I am a leaner on walls and a silent drinker of drinks, undistracted by localized conversation.
The crystalline notes of a piano meander through the room, surreptitiously necking with the tinkling sounds of glasses and silverware… In my mind it is like a lackadaisical crystal snake, or the glittery path of a bumblebee flight, the ghostly keys glinting in light of my synesthesia as they trickle loosely through the mingling guests and trays. Out of this dry orgy of decadence, this mockery of Greece or Persia in their prime, a single woman catches my eye enough to yank my head swiftly to the left. Just then she politely breaks away from a completed conversation, breasts and earrings bouncing as she purposefully crosses the room on effeminately muscular legs.
She snugly fills a slender strapless dress of white that leaves her tan shoulders exposed to the beginnings of mental undressing… caressed only by swimming black hair that spreads across her back like a waterfall of shimmering black silk. Pendulous diamond earrings pivot the light like strobes as she moves briskly, purposefully, through the crowd… one of them exposed like a teardrop dangling above her bare shoulder, the other glinting through a veil of fine hair like starlight through porous clouds.
Her species of witch has wild, Amazonian eyes… fluorescent green like jungle ferns, or a glimpse of meadow mirages undersea… altogether embodying the wildness of tropical rivers, paradise birds and exotic instruments. On cue, a spectral pan-flute incites a chill from my neck when they shoot up to pierce me from across the room. This momentary glance reads my soul and questions my presence there, just before she looks away, continuing her path with a tilt of her head and a flip of her hair from her ear. A passing wave of audacity strikes me with a sudden fever… so uncharacteristic of my humble disposition. I feel the heat rise on my neck as I call to her and interrupt her path – almost offensively against nature, it seems – shattering my unofficial oath of silence and daring to take a gamble on my dignity.
Masking her surprise and offense with a waxing curiosity, she breaks the graceful symmetry of her path by shouldering past some man to get to my corner. My body heat rises as her form approaches, her mouth half-open and her slender eyebrows curiously raised in lieu of a verbal response. Once she is close, invigorating perfume radiates from her collarbone, and I can see that a wispy, silver-charmed necklace rests there against a sloping bed of flawless skin. A cross or an ankh, I cannot tell with a peripheral glimpse, but it is too late to risk my eyes lingering so near to her cleavage… for at present she gazes up at me with each emerald jewel of an iris, as if patiently awaiting my words to see what forces they may feign to invoke. I take a moment’s swim in her eyes… for the eyes that once shot lightning at room’s length now become a thoughtful spring to bathe in.
The maddened, wanton-poetic devil inside me begs me to ask her… “Where did you steal a young native girl’s eyes… and what audacious god allowed you to combine them with the polished weaponry of your urbane form?” But I ignore the whispered assaults on my conscience, and ask her only if she would allow me to buy her a drink. But her glass is already filled, she assures me with a sympathetic smile, and she is not to be drinking much more for the night. I politely withdraw in hidden disappointment, wondering if a mad poet’s words would have fared me any better… but my eyes have eaten their fill, even if my heart has taken nary a bite.
She disappears back into the crowd, her long, black, Rapunzel hair luring my line of sight down to her hips writhing in that slender dress… like a python’s girth dancing rhythmically in a taut cloth bag… until the human gates formed from drinking, bantering fools close around her parting grace. She was a cruise ship rendezvous, a nightclub Cleopatra… but little did I know she carried more sad farewells than an airport romance. As a childish sorrow and a scolding devil-poet begin to creep up my back to join me in a stare over shoulder, I can’t help but think that somewhere else in this jungle of a place a man is pouring some radiant fox another round, celebrating the fact that his words drew more blood for the kill than mine. Alas, some men are sorcerers… tamers of the witch… others have lips long since dried of magic.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
Read more prose-poems like this as well as formal poetry in my collection:
Dreams in the Womb
available in 6 x 9 softcover and Kindle editions.
Also feel free to check out my website:
http://www.bgpetit.com
The crystalline notes of a piano meander through the room, surreptitiously necking with the tinkling sounds of glasses and silverware… In my mind it is like a lackadaisical crystal snake, or the glittery path of a bumblebee flight, the ghostly keys glinting in light of my synesthesia as they trickle loosely through the mingling guests and trays. Out of this dry orgy of decadence, this mockery of Greece or Persia in their prime, a single woman catches my eye enough to yank my head swiftly to the left. Just then she politely breaks away from a completed conversation, breasts and earrings bouncing as she purposefully crosses the room on effeminately muscular legs.
She snugly fills a slender strapless dress of white that leaves her tan shoulders exposed to the beginnings of mental undressing… caressed only by swimming black hair that spreads across her back like a waterfall of shimmering black silk. Pendulous diamond earrings pivot the light like strobes as she moves briskly, purposefully, through the crowd… one of them exposed like a teardrop dangling above her bare shoulder, the other glinting through a veil of fine hair like starlight through porous clouds.
Her species of witch has wild, Amazonian eyes… fluorescent green like jungle ferns, or a glimpse of meadow mirages undersea… altogether embodying the wildness of tropical rivers, paradise birds and exotic instruments. On cue, a spectral pan-flute incites a chill from my neck when they shoot up to pierce me from across the room. This momentary glance reads my soul and questions my presence there, just before she looks away, continuing her path with a tilt of her head and a flip of her hair from her ear. A passing wave of audacity strikes me with a sudden fever… so uncharacteristic of my humble disposition. I feel the heat rise on my neck as I call to her and interrupt her path – almost offensively against nature, it seems – shattering my unofficial oath of silence and daring to take a gamble on my dignity.
Masking her surprise and offense with a waxing curiosity, she breaks the graceful symmetry of her path by shouldering past some man to get to my corner. My body heat rises as her form approaches, her mouth half-open and her slender eyebrows curiously raised in lieu of a verbal response. Once she is close, invigorating perfume radiates from her collarbone, and I can see that a wispy, silver-charmed necklace rests there against a sloping bed of flawless skin. A cross or an ankh, I cannot tell with a peripheral glimpse, but it is too late to risk my eyes lingering so near to her cleavage… for at present she gazes up at me with each emerald jewel of an iris, as if patiently awaiting my words to see what forces they may feign to invoke. I take a moment’s swim in her eyes… for the eyes that once shot lightning at room’s length now become a thoughtful spring to bathe in.
The maddened, wanton-poetic devil inside me begs me to ask her… “Where did you steal a young native girl’s eyes… and what audacious god allowed you to combine them with the polished weaponry of your urbane form?” But I ignore the whispered assaults on my conscience, and ask her only if she would allow me to buy her a drink. But her glass is already filled, she assures me with a sympathetic smile, and she is not to be drinking much more for the night. I politely withdraw in hidden disappointment, wondering if a mad poet’s words would have fared me any better… but my eyes have eaten their fill, even if my heart has taken nary a bite.
She disappears back into the crowd, her long, black, Rapunzel hair luring my line of sight down to her hips writhing in that slender dress… like a python’s girth dancing rhythmically in a taut cloth bag… until the human gates formed from drinking, bantering fools close around her parting grace. She was a cruise ship rendezvous, a nightclub Cleopatra… but little did I know she carried more sad farewells than an airport romance. As a childish sorrow and a scolding devil-poet begin to creep up my back to join me in a stare over shoulder, I can’t help but think that somewhere else in this jungle of a place a man is pouring some radiant fox another round, celebrating the fact that his words drew more blood for the kill than mine. Alas, some men are sorcerers… tamers of the witch… others have lips long since dried of magic.
- (c) Brandon Gene Petit
Read more prose-poems like this as well as formal poetry in my collection:
Dreams in the Wombavailable in 6 x 9 softcover and Kindle editions.
Also feel free to check out my website:
http://www.bgpetit.com
