An Almost-Marriage Proposal at Église Saint Jean Baptiste
All it takes is you with Chopin’s “Nocturne” between your fingers, and I see white afternoons and dark tea with cream, sparks like late summer sun on polished silver. Hear our linen curtains lilting, revealing a courtyard garden, but that is a different poem, a different movement. Maybe the piano bench creaks as you shift, squeaks and growls a bit against the wood floors. They are not pristine. We are not necessarily in love. The dog is chasing his tail, and you, my dear, are waltzing with a faceless stranger.
You close your eyes, lean in. Work the pedals with your slippered toes, please. Our neighbors bring us flowers, and we spend our days changing the water, cutting the stems, our evenings over stiff drinks and light fare. There are papers and books in neat piles on the dining table, where maybe the cat sometimes sleeps, so we stand in the ample kitchen instead, with friends or alone, together. Champagne. Mornings at our laptops over emails, Mimosas, grumbling at Spell Check and Word. Maybe even newspapers.
Like mismatched socks who’ve lost their mates, we would have the occasional houseguest. Soon, we will both be ever searching for our reading glasses, sharing the pairs we have at hand. Tattered robes from five-stars in Madrid and Amsterdam. Separate rooms if not separate vacations. My heart will stop one day as you tickle that passionate peak near the end of this most melancholy nocturne, and you won’t even notice I’ve gone—so intent are you upon the keys. Play, mon cher. Jouez. I’ll still be listening, and the dog will still be humping the towel I left on the floor.
Flight of the dragonfly 