1
We met under a tree
Under a tree in the season of its bloom
Under the bright purple flowers of the Jacaranda
You leaned on the tree and it illuminated you
Though tears fell on your cheeks.
I stood obverse, observing you Full, to the brim, of inferiority;
Pining for you as a prisoner yearns for freedom,
Needing you as windmills need the wind
Stalagmites and stalactites of emotion mushrooming
And yet my tongue hid exiled in my belly
We met under a tree
I seeking a satisfactory nod
You seeking to reclaim a love lost, freshly lost.
Under the guise of counselor I won your time
Though, in turn, I lost mine completely
Lust came before love for me;
Love almost never came for you towards me:
Lust then was indismissably necessary for love –
Your questionable reluctance was as much an ingredient as well.
Your eyes foresaw my intention, examining my with strict caution
And your body denied ever suspecting my schemes
We met under a tree
And I kissed your cheek while you whispered –
Words of discontent, disapproval, clearest prohibition –
Before you leaned on that tree, before it elucidated you
Before tears fell on your cheek.
But though tears trickled on your cheeks,
Though my tongue was sunken deep in my belly,
Though I won your time and lost mine completely,
Though your body denied ever suspecting my schemes,
And though your teary eyes noticed my self-derision
You, in the dim-lit corridor of your cracked heart, beckoned me.
We met under a tree,
The only thing of beauty: a solitary tree in the plains,
A solitary me, a solitary you – the solitary three.
It rained underneath the flowery Jacaranda tree:
The tree’s water-drops, your tears, and my bias our emblems.
You looked ripe and very much forbidden,
Your breasts inviting yet sacrosanct and sacred
And I fixation my eyes to the very object of my temptation.
The heaving was heavy with random unsteady rhythms.
My shivering hands met behind your carved back.
Still, your body denied ever suspecting my schemes.
And though you were decently dressed and fairly covered
You appeared dreadfully naked with so much detail to it.
I was like the sun in the west at sunset,
Like lightning to the tallest alpine tree,
Carnal and vulnerably exposed and wishing I was worse.
Still, your body denied affiliation with this charade.
2
I spent countless days
In the shade of the Jacaranda
Tree under which we met and stray waves
Of air brought countless whiffs of spring.
I was like a lonely cloud over drought-stricken land,
A man whose ghost existed long before he died, strands
Of my wraith a cumulus cloud shoved by the wind’s hands.
I would come and go Coming in hopes of finding you helplessly expecting
Me; and going in hopes that I would need you no more.
I multiplied disappointmen by disappointment not accepting
That serendipity was the absence of design: it isn’t assigned.
That no engine is serviced before it is aligned.
I had to release my heart whence it was quarantined.
You kissed me back and freed my tongue
From my belly.The gab descended on me like tongues of fire.
I stroked your forbidden breasts and felt the rising of your lungs,
It was like a shift of octaves of sopranos in a expertly choir
During a marked transposition that is meant to transform
A ditty into a masterpiece. Love took form.
It was a kiss that shook the nerves yet calming all my storms.
3
Finally I broke the silence To describe your undecipherable gaze and your limpid eyes.
I gave you the depths of my essence, and my confidence.
The song of your kiss played once more a bit more simplified.
This our new finding became my most treasured,
A blessing over and beyond what could be measured:
You soon became a copious well of endless indescribable pleasures.
We met underneath the tree, our safest and official tryst.
You spoke deep, about Socrates and other philosophers, about Jesus Christ;
About literature, oil on canvas, about true and false; of U2 and Bono;
About love’s awkward mismatches: Bill and Lewensky, Lennon and Yoko Ono, Ahab and Jezebel, Oedipus and his mother, Mandela and Machel’s widow
Love made me see the world differently, looking out the window.
I saw a home where we stood, a birthplace of a different genre Of love. The kids were revealed to me in your kisses, Espera and Henry.
It was hope that swept away all uncertainty and promised fruition –
The shade beneath the tree, like the grace of peeping into the future –
Of all diligently pursued dreams and properly cultivated visions,
An unfaltering guarantee of success for all benevolent decisions.
We met under a tree
Under a tree in the season of its bloom
Under the bright purple flowers of the Jacaranda
You leaned on the tree and it illuminated you
Though tears fell on your cheeks.
I stood obverse, observing you Full, to the brim, of inferiority;
Pining for you as a prisoner yearns for freedom,
Needing you as windmills need the wind
Stalagmites and stalactites of emotion mushrooming
And yet my tongue hid exiled in my belly
We met under a tree
I seeking a satisfactory nod
You seeking to reclaim a love lost, freshly lost.
Under the guise of counselor I won your time
Though, in turn, I lost mine completely
Lust came before love for me;
Love almost never came for you towards me:
Lust then was indismissably necessary for love –
Your questionable reluctance was as much an ingredient as well.
Your eyes foresaw my intention, examining my with strict caution
And your body denied ever suspecting my schemes
We met under a tree
And I kissed your cheek while you whispered –
Words of discontent, disapproval, clearest prohibition –
Before you leaned on that tree, before it elucidated you
Before tears fell on your cheek.
But though tears trickled on your cheeks,
Though my tongue was sunken deep in my belly,
Though I won your time and lost mine completely,
Though your body denied ever suspecting my schemes,
And though your teary eyes noticed my self-derision
You, in the dim-lit corridor of your cracked heart, beckoned me.
We met under a tree,
The only thing of beauty: a solitary tree in the plains,
A solitary me, a solitary you – the solitary three.
It rained underneath the flowery Jacaranda tree:
The tree’s water-drops, your tears, and my bias our emblems.
You looked ripe and very much forbidden,
Your breasts inviting yet sacrosanct and sacred
And I fixation my eyes to the very object of my temptation.
The heaving was heavy with random unsteady rhythms.
My shivering hands met behind your carved back.
Still, your body denied ever suspecting my schemes.
And though you were decently dressed and fairly covered
You appeared dreadfully naked with so much detail to it.
I was like the sun in the west at sunset,
Like lightning to the tallest alpine tree,
Carnal and vulnerably exposed and wishing I was worse.
Still, your body denied affiliation with this charade.
2
I spent countless days
In the shade of the Jacaranda
Tree under which we met and stray waves
Of air brought countless whiffs of spring.
I was like a lonely cloud over drought-stricken land,
A man whose ghost existed long before he died, strands
Of my wraith a cumulus cloud shoved by the wind’s hands.
I would come and go Coming in hopes of finding you helplessly expecting
Me; and going in hopes that I would need you no more.
I multiplied disappointmen by disappointment not accepting
That serendipity was the absence of design: it isn’t assigned.
That no engine is serviced before it is aligned.
I had to release my heart whence it was quarantined.
You kissed me back and freed my tongue
From my belly.The gab descended on me like tongues of fire.
I stroked your forbidden breasts and felt the rising of your lungs,
It was like a shift of octaves of sopranos in a expertly choir
During a marked transposition that is meant to transform
A ditty into a masterpiece. Love took form.
It was a kiss that shook the nerves yet calming all my storms.
3
Finally I broke the silence To describe your undecipherable gaze and your limpid eyes.
I gave you the depths of my essence, and my confidence.
The song of your kiss played once more a bit more simplified.
This our new finding became my most treasured,
A blessing over and beyond what could be measured:
You soon became a copious well of endless indescribable pleasures.
We met underneath the tree, our safest and official tryst.
You spoke deep, about Socrates and other philosophers, about Jesus Christ;
About literature, oil on canvas, about true and false; of U2 and Bono;
About love’s awkward mismatches: Bill and Lewensky, Lennon and Yoko Ono, Ahab and Jezebel, Oedipus and his mother, Mandela and Machel’s widow
Love made me see the world differently, looking out the window.
I saw a home where we stood, a birthplace of a different genre Of love. The kids were revealed to me in your kisses, Espera and Henry.
It was hope that swept away all uncertainty and promised fruition –
The shade beneath the tree, like the grace of peeping into the future –
Of all diligently pursued dreams and properly cultivated visions,
An unfaltering guarantee of success for all benevolent decisions.
