Somewhere between morning and now
Somewhere between morning and now
as I harvest beans, deadhead marigolds,
and cradle the plump, sun-warmed
flesh of a Cherokee purple, I remember
you and me lying on the hill above Athens,
Ohio not Greece, in the grass we called curly
for the way the blades embraced our naked
sunbaked bodies as we made love.
Somewhere between that dawn
and this noon our skins abandoned
their tight fit, sagged, sloughed free
like the blanched peel of a tomato
stewed in its own juice, its seeds,
like ours, passed on to future gardens.
Chores done, I step into the dim present,
to watch you napping, still as an effigy
on a royal tomb, hands cupping the place
where I once laid my head to savor
the beating pulse of love after lust.
My heart stutters over the desire
to lie once more where we once lay
somewhere between morning and now.
Janet E. Irvin is a career educator, author, and poet. Writing as J.E. Irvin, she is the author of seven mystery/thriller novels. Her poems, short stories, and essays have appeared in a variety of publications, including Hawaii Pacific Review, Creosote, The Raven’s Perch, Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, and Literary Mama and the anthologies Songs for Wild Ohio and A Shape Produced By a Curve. Irvin is a member of the Greenville Poets, Sisters in Crime, Central Ohio Fiction Writers, and Buckeye Crime Writers. In addition to writing, she serves on the Springboro City Park Board and is a member of the Springboro Area Historical Society. She and her husband reside in southwest Ohio on the edge of a nature park, which serves as inspiration for much of her work.