Untouched

Good wine with a good steak with a potato baked for an hour with sour cream and scallions and butter and salt and fresh cracked pepper.  A soft kiss on lips that you can tell are trembling against the want that dances in the blood that gives them their color.  A smile.  From her.  The feel of the corner of your mouth going up.  A smile.  But at her.  Or something she said.

Hot water.  Painful.  But just barely painful.  Your skin going pink.  Sweating under the steam of the shower stinging you into wakefulness.  Hard to breath but clean.  Turn the water off and just begin to sweat.  Run your hand through your hair and feel the formerly hot water cool on your back as it races past your most naked parts and down your legs so cold that it leaves a trace of goose bumps.

Goose bumps.   Goose bumps while living so far south that you had never seen geese.  But as you exhale you see the world.  Blues and greens and yellows and browns leap out at you from the things that are unchanged from the day that God himself traced a finger over them.   The absence of color screams at you from the time before the Almighty cleared His throat.

The steak tastes of char and blood.  The potato tastes of scallion and butter and cream gone to sour.  Salt.  The almost bitterness of wine finds the blood and evaporates as it is swallowed.  Again.  Again.  Again.  Yet another bite.

Inhale.  The noise of the modern.  Everyone doing everything.  And no farther than the time it takes thumb and forefinger to find phone.  The sun peaks in from the corner that is not guarded by sunglasses.  She holds your hand and you step lively - never betraying the future that you can't see.   The glare clears.  Ferris Wheels and roller coasters dance out before you.  Laughter. Loudly.  What else can you do?

Kiss her.  And then...  But...  She kisses...  Kiss her.  Kiss her.  Hold her tight.  Feel her breath on your neck.  Hold her.  Try not to melt as she melts into you.  Her breath coming up to tickle your ear.  Smiling.   Her teeth just on bottom of your left ear.  Pulling back.  Smiling in shock and awesome confusion.   Biting your own lip as she clicks her teeth together in threat / promise.

The last breath of winter trying to move the curtain dramatically.  Failing.  The cold of the early spring trying to masquerade as the rebirth of life.  Failing.  Life - carrying on.  Simply.  Her fingers intertwine with mine.  I kneel to the flowers.  I inhale.   I am rewarded with the smells of my youth.  I am mortal.  This earth is mortal.  My love is mortal.  This time is untouched.  She smiles at me and I take yet another sip of wine.  Her glass sits untouched.