the po~et 19 (tennis anyone?)

Jack rushed to get to campus Monday morning. She had anticipated all day Sunday Paul's reaction to the books. She carefully wrote a note to him in a card choosing her words as not to sound too forward. She had always been pursued now that she was actually initiating contact was a new experience and she wasn't quite sure she knew how to do so.

As always, when she enters the building that houses his office anxiety takes over. As many times as she has visited him, she is still nervous like a silly teenager. That has been the one thing she has attributed to her infatuation with Paul, she seemed younger--re-vitalized. Her mind reset to a new way of thinking, no a new way of living.

When she opens the door he is quite surprised to see her (she hadn't given him forewarning of her visit) but he is pleased. She wanted to look and smell especially nice this morning. She was hoping that he would notice her efforts.

When she saw him she was almost speechless, but she had promised herself she would allow words to form and be released from her mouth. He was pleased with his gift, she was relieved. His eyes always told how he was feeling and for her to see satisfaction in them made her want to hide in them. To lock that moment away and store it in a trunk where moths couldn't come and corrupt it.

Then Paul does something he had restrained himself from in times past, he rises from his desk and hugs her. His body towering over hers offered a semblance of protection. The kind of protection that would keep her warm at night and delighted in the morning.

When she left him she could still feel his body against hers. As she walked away, her body responded to his touch and her heart followed, she was content with having made her move now the ball was in his court.

the po~et 18 (the black swan bookstore)

Jack stumbles across a used bookstore and gazes in the store fronts' window. The books in the window immediately peak her interest. She opens the squeaky door and the aroma of old pages immediately excites her. It is hard for her to know where to begin. She decides to start with the collection in the window. The owner of the quaint little store is amused to see someone enjoy his collected treasures. He gives her a quick tour, offers her a ladder and tells her to spend the rest of the afternoon indulging herself.

She searches through the shelves hunting for the authors words that speak to her as well as those that would satisfy his appetite. She wishes Paul was there to share her enthusiasm. The lust for words artfully orchestrated to account for events past, present, future, real--of fantasies, dreams and visions. Stories that haunted until they were told. Shelves filled with accounts of far away lands from the Mediterranean, the coasts of Africa, to the waters off the shores of exotic islands. Although he already posses an impressive library, she believes he would be just as enthralled with this place as she is.

She has been there for quite some time now and the aroma of time weathered books has aroused her. She imagines them there together passionately scavenging through this treasure chest, and after they would have satisfied their hunger for words they would search out a corner between the shelves. Their love for the power of language, it's meaning and usage gives them a common place. A place to meet undisturbed. The characters they create and those they discover through these volumes are who they have become. She finds a collection of an authors work that she knows he admires and decides to purchase it for him. She pictures how his face full of pleasure as he opens the gift. She has given up on trying to prevent herself from falling in love with him, it was hopeless, he now owned her heart.

Soon she looses all sense of time and place, intoxicated from this new found space, her mind succumbs to fantasy. She envisions them standing surrounded by stories old and new, his hand would move up her legs and find a way to uncover her hidden secrets. She would have him, make love to him down on the floor between the shelves, shielded by their volumes and under the watchful eye of Poe.