(Phoebe is one of my closest friends. We were roommates in graduate school. This was written in the late '70s)
by Susan Fox
by Susan Fox
Tonight,
you opened the window,
you opened the window,
surrendered your most difficult thoughts
to the seduction of the violin.
Jerky angle of legs and arms in victory fisted,
Phoebe, tonight, I saw you square dance gladness,
rise above the staring clouds,
driven to the rapture of the open sky.
The trees roared and clapped their branches.
Clouds, eyebrows raised,
disinterestedly drifted by,
and I, helpless,
ran back and forth
like an insect struck by celestial pandemonium.
Later,
the wind left you on a cold square of earth;
it scattered each of your most precious thoughts.
Dear, I could not retrieve them,
so we went home in a funeral march,
not a rendering of Elton.
Now, there is a short blast of wind
and you abandon your soul
to a pile of leaves;
they cackle with black premonition.
In me, there is a frightened squirrel,
running the obvious circles
around an old cage.
In you, there is a thorny well
filled with vain regrets.
I’ve looked for your windows
but they are always open to the black sky,
the vicious and eternal night.
