saturday morning sketches

eyes like drops of sapphire paint in a bucket of white, liquid marbles, december day clear, the kindness of a young school teacher, alive with the road ahead, gated lashes, a gentle arch of brow plucked, punctuating the cheek, rising, highlights drawn in sun upon morning dunes of snow

she tilts her head. parts her lips. a touch of tongue silent as the lesson loud, bells of school ringing in the mind, of old wooden desks squawking and the perfume of fresh chalk sacrificed, of large clocks with black hands and white faces and ceiling fans twirling slow, casting lazy humid shadows, of buttoned blouses and pleated skirts and the easy movements of languid afternoons, of heels metronoming the hall beyond frosted doors and still those lips, two curves to the well beyond time where hours become minutes and women become memories

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she said goodbye like the wind, like a child, like an old person who couldn't be bothered with sentiment, afraid of betraying the heart with the eye in the gloaming of relationship, of the forked path, of the tragedy of geography, of a mother watching her son slip away