Work in Progress
A Mexican woman
With a sensual face, broad-lipped,
The right size and age.
Her hair fell
like a soft curtain on his face
as she bent her ear to hear
him respond
To her friendly question
“Why are you smiling at me?”
She had asked.
He had had a clear, sidewise
look at her
from the end of the loud bar,
and she was often turned
in his direction,
chatting with a female friend—
three of them there
in a party to watch the
Superbowl—
the gringa friend’s
husband making the third.
Against the background clatter,
cresting tides of excited noise were incessant,
Responding to the broadcast fortunes
of one of the teams or the other,
but, laying beneath,
there was a fluttering feeling in the crowd.
During commercial breaks especially,
some of that body
were unconsciously inspired to quest in their
surroundings for some clue
to the greater meaning
of the moment.
Eyes were cast about, and,
in a fraction of a flickering second,
His connected with hers--
They both knew it was coming.
Then it was there and then
it was gone.
They both knew
that it would happen
again.
A spark had been lit,
The usual business
had been disturbed.
You wouldn't--couldn't--
walk out on something like that.
A little later,
he watched her take a shot,
probably tequila.
He was on his second beer.
The game droned on, on multiple televisions,
but became more of a background.
He couldn’t have told you who had the greater score.
The locus of his feelings was shifting south.
A couple of more passes later.
They locked on again.
And soon after,
again.
The room had contracted,
The space between them--
Electrified...
He felt tempted by her allure--no doubt,
And frightened for the threat
to his marriage.
He had made a decision
to neither deny his attraction,
Nor his wedding band.
In other words:
the revealing path of
honesty.
He would let the
sheer pleasure of her company
be his guide.
