Floral Notes

9:59

A jazz quartets taking its first breath

Trumpets under cymbals over saxophones

It’s a train ride through Chicago

They gossip to the string section

Candle lit shadows dancing for the room

Suspended in whisps of smoke

Draped Table cloths hide the scared wood underneath

Everyone’s hiding something tonight

Leave your masks at the door

I couldn’t rsvp

Someone else has my heart

I’m not even tapping my foot now

We share a cigarette with the filter ripped off

Her eyes catch mine

We freeze

I count her freckles out loud

She thinks I’m keeping time with the band

A few strands of her curly charcoal hair frame her face

Another lays near her brow

Living in contrast to the rest

I can’t have her

She makes my sugar rise

She rewrites my poems

She brakes me

I break everything else

Espresso martini glasses once filled

Sit in the middle of everything

She laughs

Bites her lip

And then her finger

She looks soft and vulnerable

She isn’t

She’s just learned how to mesmerize

A tattoo flashes from her wrist

She looks back and raises her eyebrows

Rising now she dances alone

Her spin reveals a body that could start a war

Men have fought over less

The songs over

But we’ve just started playing