Poem for Wednesday

On the Metro
By C.K. Williams

On the metro, I have to ask a young woman to move the packages beside her to make room for me;
she’s reading, her foot propped on the seat in front of her, and barely looks up as she pulls them to her.
I sit, take out my own book—Cioran, The Temptation to Exist—and notice her glancing up from hers
to take in the title of mine, and then, as Gombrowicz puts it, she “affirms herself physically,” that is,
becomes present in a way she hadn’t been before: though she hasn’t moved, she’s allowed herself
to come more sharply into focus, be more accessible to my sensual perception, so I can’t help but remark
her strong figure and very tan skin—(how literally golden young women can look at the end of summer.)
She leans back now, and as the train rocks and her arm brushes mine she doesn’t pull it away;
she seems to be allowing our surfaces to unite: the fine hairs on both our forearms, sensitive, alive,
achingly alive, bring news of someone touched, someone sensed, and thus acknowledged, known.

I understand that in no way is she offering more than this, and in truth I have no desire for more,
but it’s still enough for me to be taken by a surge, first of warmth then of something like its opposite:
a memory—a girl I’d mooned for from afar, across the table from me in the library in school now,
our feet I thought touching, touching even again, and then, with all I craved that touch to mean,
my having to realize it wasn’t her flesh my flesh for that gleaming time had pressed, but a table leg.
The young woman today removes her arm now, stands, swaying against the lurch of the slowing train,
and crossing before me brushes my knee and does that thing again, asserts her bodily being again,
(Gombrowicz again), then quickly moves to the door of the car and descends, not once looking back,
(to my relief not looking back), and I allow myself the thought that though I must be to her again
as senseless as that table of my youth, as wooden, as unfeeling, perhaps there was a moment I was not.

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This is going to be another quickie because I spent all day trying to catch up! Hubby took me out to lunch Tuesday since he didn't Monday, so I have now been extraordinarily well-fed (and am having lunch with tomorrow for her birthday, hee)! I am nearly ready to mail my holiday cards -- it would help if I remembered to buy stamps, but at least I remembered envelopes! Now I just have to remember not to mail slash to the relatives or family stuff to fannish friends. Wrote an article about Star Trek: Legacy, which apparently all the serious gaming people think sucks -- it will be interesting to see if I get angry notes for reporting that fact -- and another that was supposed to be about Sirtis and Trinneer appearing together on Without a Trace, which of course I didn't watch and I doubt it would have made anything up to me for "These Are the Voyages..." anyway, most of the article ended up being about Show Me the Money getting picked up, which makes a lot more sense once one notes that it is being moved opposite American Idol when I suppose ABC has to show something and is probably hoping a bit of the Boston Legal crowd will tune in early for Shatner.

In between lunch and getting envelopes and coming home to get younger son to drive to Hebrew school, I also stopped at Ritz Camera and bought myself a polarizing filter. So you will be seeing fewer photos with this kind of glare, hopefully, though I took these with the little teeny Nikon so it couldn't be helped (does anyone have a recommendation among inexpensive little teeny cameras BTW, for days I don't want to schlep the DSLR but might see something awesome that must be photographed?)


Seagulls at the lake at Rio yesterday.


They were probably disappointed that the ice of a few days earlier had melted and they couldn't stand on the lake.


Though the geese (who don't migrate, because why bother when you have temperate weather and food year round) seemed happy!

I keep looking for a community where people share pages they've made for their Book of Shadows; I always see people on eBay selling Book of Shadows inserts, some with original art by themselves but some that are compilations of rituals, spells and sayings from other sources with art by famous painters, and I keep thinking, you know, I know people who would do this more nicely and would probably be interested and some who do this sort of thing already, the way I do. So I finally gave up and made , where I have not yet posted anything but tomorrow I will put up some of my Jewitch stuff, which has very nice artwork snicked from a wide variety of professional sources. *g* If you do any sort of spellwork or solitary rituals and are interested in sharing, even if you are more Jewish or Christian or agnostic than Pagan or Wiccan, please join and post!

And by the way, Dennis Prager is NOT Jewish. Also, Dennis Prager is NOT American. I don't know why he's claiming to be either, when clearly he has more in common with the architects of the Spanish Inquisition. Also, anyone who is planning to get Left Behind: The Game for Christmas should unfriend me now, because if you talk about it, I'll post a nice long rant in your journal before beating you to the punch. Man, holiday season...