Man and Woman in Café

Man in blue striped shirt
watches woman in black leather boots
click-clacking heels across burnt red tiles
stretching long thin legs
that spread the short black skirt
that hugs the tight round bottom
that holds his gaze,
his head caught
in her gravitational pull,
his neck tugged long and along
by this heavenly body
as she passes and exits,
a flash of blond zest in her wake,
and a lump of envy in my lap.

I notice that he
hasn't noticed me
but on closer examination
I realize that I

held his outstretched neck
in my peripheral vision
while the center of my eye
climbed the length of her thigh
and met him at the summit
where we paused
in humble adoration
as the desire to have
and the desire to be
coalesced
in the wild fields
of imagination.

(2006)