Long Shadows

This time the poem was about how love obliterates the self, a kind of suicide then resurrection. Perhaps because it was dark outside and only one dim bulb burned, in a lamp covered by a dark red shade with gold frills by the couch, the mood was different than usual, and Willie found himself listening with more interest, and stared at the long shadows all over the walls as Bart spoke in that funny voice, the poem voice.

There were sad people swimming in each other’s skins awhile, floating in each other’s secrets and obsessions. Willie knew he wasn’t really getting it, but he didn’t care, the sadness he got, and the loneliness. Bart was one sad and lonely dude, and Bart didn’t forget for a single second that he was dying, that any day, any hour, any minute, from the looks of him, he could fall right over and stop. In a way, Willie was looking forward to Bart checking out so he wouldn’t have to listen to this crap anymore.

And now the poem was talking about a garden where all a person’s lies about love were rotting fruit and where a person’s truth about love was good ripe fruit, and how in that garden filled with the smell of rot there was only one piece of fruit that wasn’t rotten, a lemon.