Bayou Goddess

Mitchell Winter

I watched as you tipped the ashtray,
leaving trails of matter visible in the humid air.
I watched as your eyes moved from time and place
rewinding cellophane tape within the well of your memories.
I watched you, unsure of when to proceed with your journey,
as you were trapped within the den of lions,
the squelching catacombs surrounding you
dank with the smell of sour rain and exhaust.

I watched as you became the Bayou Goddess;
the contract of your diffidence broken
and the dormant music left within you
aroused by fiery air.

But I watched you most of all when you watched me;
as I crouched near the balcony window in late summer
or drove away from the abandoned house.
I watched as I became your peak of sunlight,
freshly shorn away from the feathery womb,
gasping in the paleness of the radiant world,

Undoing breathing, reversing the inhale.

I watched as I was left in the aftermath of your departure;
sifting through lost pocketbooks and slender cards,
forgetting to remember
the tenable laugh, the sorrows,
the softest whisper of days bygone.

I watched the smoke settle amongst the cypress trees,
distilled through flocks of fireflies and heat,
and watched you once again;
you left as the sun set beyond the trees.