I Heard the Sign

Cleared throats echoed through the chamber
and you hid behind your sixty-four
I watched your every move, mine too
You played the game well, competing with my heart
my quintessence
Your eyes spoke in perfect tense
I read and heard the sign
Hand jive snapped and slapped the bond between us
More than one head looked-up from their boards
I saw a presence and felt an emphasis
Lightning fast jabs in my face, you
interrogated me with your hand rhetoric.

I closed my eyes and your words drowned in silence
finally, I could concentrate.
I wish the arbiter could hear your silence,
your eyes blinked as if to whisper an apology,
too late -
I surrendered my coat of arms
and like Kasparov, you took my soul in check.


*


Summer Girl

You were the first to break
away from our circle your
emotions ran naked through fields of loosestrife
Kathryn followed your innocence like a wolf in heat
Remember when she tugged at your shorts?
Playful teasing around the campfire, we all watched and
you ran into the woods screaming you were pregnant!
We laughed
We watched you dive off the pier and swim
your legs still the girl
smooth with a hint of maturity between your legs

Summer girl, you hid your blossoming breasts
from the rest of us,
our envy a thief of innocence
We loved
We witnessed the kiss.
When Kathryn kissed you on the lips we huddled by the boat shed
we screeched our joy in giggles and whispers
We watched you sprout wings and fly out of our lives.

It wasn’t till I entered college years later I learned
the Latin that Kathryn whispered
in your ear that summer, cunnus lingere -
We loved.

I married a man with soft hands; your hands always covered in slip,
still sculpting your life, squishing it between your fingers.
Shaping your passion like an object born not made.

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© John Heckman AKA 42


My name is John Heckman. Been married for 12 years, no kids, 2 German Shepherds, Wally and Gisela. We live in Williamsburg, Virginia. We sail on the Chesapeake Bay on our sailboat. I work in Subatomic physics studying Quarks at a National Lab here in VA. That'd be about it! Oh yeah, I like to write poetry and fiction, been writing off and on for 15 years or so.