Dangling Conversations

(...memories from another phase...)

Paul and Art -

It's a still life water color,
Of a now late afternoon,
As the sun shines through the curtained lae
And shadows wash the room.
And we sit and drink our coffee
Couched in our indifference,
Like shells upon the shore
You can hear the ocean roar
In the dangling conversation
And the superficial sighs,
The borders of our lives.
And you read your Emily Dickinson,
And I my Robert Frost,
And we note our place with bookmarkers
That measure what we've lost.
Like a poem poorly written
We are verses out of rhythm,
Couplets out of rhyme,
In syncopated time
And the dangled conversation
And the superficial sighs,
Are the borders of our lives.

Yes, we speak of things that matter,
With words that must be said,
"Can analysis be worthwhile?"
"Is the theater really dead?"
And how the room is softly faded
And I only kiss your shadow,
I cannot feel your hand,
You're a stranger now unto me
Lost in the dangling conversation.
And the superficial sighs,
In the borders of our lives.


Conversations undangled

As we sit there
And you drink my coffee
Our life turns into a movie
In eastman colour.

Did you hear the waves last night
Lashing against the shore?
I sure did not as I was more
Or less asleep in your arms.

Now the conversation's undangled,
No more words need to be said -
Let's just go straight to bed
And talk of unimportant things.

Like couplets out of rhyme,
We swam a-round and round,
Until in each other we found
the beauty of free verse.