Cherry Tattoo Woman

across the corner
of my eye i see
the expletives
in her inebriated grace forming
a series of masterful motions.
sunlight clings across her skin,
coloring with a burnt palette in impressionistic
brush strokes similar
to my own skin.


trying to disable the images of her in my mind
i make special note around the bottom,
her undersized bathing suit and
near her love handles.
what i find is
a discolored cherry pressed on her skin before
our present fleeting glances and after the rebelling i would
have probably found in her younger days.

the glow of a flame
dangles on her cigarette,
slowly eating and leaving behind
fragile ash.
i see three children
circling around her
like a soon to be fresh kill.
she looks with annoyance before
removing them with ice cream
money for the beach snack house.

suddenly the romanticism
fades, the mystery suffocates
with all the fantasies
i could have embellished.