An Herbal Delight of Vanilla and Maple Blend

Rubbing gently across my brow
a stone cut cup
holding tea of a vanilla and maple blend.
Hot
I part lips and kiss the wind
blowing heat and steam to create
mists that drift into an open sky
bitter and chilled.
Autumn
dry leaves
shriveled and blacked
lifeless from the cold.
I rest.
Seated before a painted horizon
as brilliant as it is somber.

Third wall to a triangle
oblong and unequal,
Sip
I burn my tongue
one which tasted you from head to toe
now numbed by my herbal delight.
Silence
like the air
I sit
knowing that you lie above
in darkness
no longer a creature of the light.
Now demoted to a non-fictional character
drawn out of proportion,
much like the triangle.
Drawn from tension
unable to be released.
We all --
one lying,
one running,
the other sitting,
wait for winter's touch
and another cup of herbal delight.

Passion hurts when you give it freely
from the doorstep,
to the bedroom,
and into the heart
where it seeds,
and grows,
placing all that it is
in shadow.
And I cut it down
into chips of kindle
to burn
heating everything
in you,
in me,
and in the other.
No longer equal and strong,
forever numbed by the burning.
Forever drinking herbal tea
of a vanilla and maple blend.



An Herbal Delight of Vanilla and Maple Blend by Shazza Nakim
Copyright © by Peace of Mind Publishings and with permission by Shazza Nakim