Taking Tea

I think this is my most complete work to date everything else still strikes me as unfinished in some way

Taking tea,

In summer, wind sweeping
The sun room’s glass,
As summer storms

Trickle across the windows.
From cake to cake as rain fills the balmy air
Tempestuous sighs to

 March grey skies.

Ah the questions you ask,
Soft voice  

Tender tone!
While the answers I gave

 Cut with hoarse voice,
And harsh thoughts-

Of movies old and new:

The silver screen-
Sepia tone images,
French women,

Well past splendour
Restless

 Translucent, picturing her voice echo

Words,

 

“I just wish I were a lot older or a lot younger.”

“Je souhaite simplement j'étais beaucoup plus âgé ou beaucoup plus jeune.”

My eyes,

 Fixed on the floor,
As we take our tea,

Those cakes,
Rich, indulgent

So much like our devotion

Transitory,

Perhaps too affluent,
Perhaps too much.
Yet with heavy heart,

I come to sit with you.

In your age so much more than
Just a girl, and so far from being a woman-

When we take tea,

 In the winter months
The ironic rays of jealous sun,
Cold across our faces,

and warm upon the morning snow

The warm voices fill us to the brim
Light chatter of frivolous things,

And smoke
Nursery rhymes and gentle songs

Stories, fairytales ah
Your youth when

 You’re so much older-
So much older than I wish you to be

And myself so much younger,

So much younger than you need.
It comes to time

The gaps between you and I

Yet, “Happiness is beneficial for the body,
But it is grief that develops the powers of the mind”

Pourtant, “le bonheur est bénéfique pour le corps,
mais c'est le chagrin qui développe les compétences de l'esprit.”

The petulant look,

Captured in your
In your crazed eyes-

 That stare me out,
Hold me frighten me,

Send shivers through

Through the spine of skeletons hanging on your walls!

The morbid decorations,
Reminders of mortality, you told me
“Those old bones, yes those old bones,
Belongings to someone I once knew,”

The strangeness of this forced me to choke
Ahh how I choked on the cold tea,
In my warm throat-

How we moved from fairytales,
Romance and nursery rhymes
To, skeletons and mortality.
Just like you to jump

One

Extreme

Straight to the other, at times you’re lost
Yet we take tea together everyday
And everyday you’re someone else
A different figure in the smoky room
Eyes smiling or eyes crying,
A soft voice tender tone or-

Harsh words from chapped lips,
And every time the same song,
The same song hangs in the air
Gentle delicate then harsh.

 

Author's Note

Constructive destruction only please

Reviews

[Alicante lullaby]

touching,what more can I SAY,such innocent emotions,so truthfully pictured,very sensitive,pretty much paints a vivid image of two strangers so very familier to each other.....but then this is what happened in the meadows of Eden,and will happen till end,two strangers very familier one having the ability to jump to extremes.two poles of a magnet.one south,one north together till eternity.....knowing each other yet always strangers.

[Ms. Gruye]

this reminded me of Prufrock in style...good job conveying an entire story while maintaining poetic dignity. That is so say, you used images and emotions masterfully to keep the poem on pace. Your word choice and tone carried through nicely.

viva la

[mizzfizz]

Very striking. I love the contrast of youth and mortality and the contrasting images of fairytales and skeletons. Your two instances of the English followed by its French translation was also very effective. Including the quote by Proust: Pourtant, "le bonheur est b�n�fique pour le corps, mais c'est le chagrin qui d�veloppe les comp�tences de l'esprit."...So lovely and moving.

[Lady Lazarus.]

"In your age so much more than
Just a girl, and so far from being a woman- "
this actually made feel awe struck!a poem of such tender feelings written with such innocence and pain making such a sad but beautiful poem...

[Naomi Montana Walsh]

I have read and read .. poem after , poem it is rare when one is as intelligent and innocent as this one .. so beautiful..transitions work so well... some poetry seems to heavy for me and some too light this one.. was perfect..