Clandestine Affair Poem by Cheryl L. DaytecYañgot

(For Fred as He Dreams on the Foot of the Alps)

He is mine in opaque spaces
unexplored by the public eye
Holding his hand, I see the
Alps twirl in rapturous delight
The perishing dark flirts with the
early morn as it kisses the dew
The wars are stilled by peace;
nightmares are soothed by dreams
The summer rain capitulates to
the sunshine; they resuscitate a
stiff edelweiss struggling from
the cold under the white snow
Life is beyond Death’s reach

I am a hideous flower transformed
to beauty after its maiden kiss from
the handsomest bee in Eden
I know how Bathsheba felt under
David’s admiring, eager stare
From my lover's lips freely stream
the words I implored from every
lover in my honeyed fantasies
Juliet, my heart capers as yours
did when Romeo professed his
love; it was too beautiful to end
Death had to give it eternal life
in the lovely legend it became
It is no myth from Shakespeare’s
gossip mill; it is my reality when I,
within the confines of invisible
places, explore his naked body and
enter the farthest corner of his soul

Alas, in the parks, in the church,
in the presence of the crowd
I am a stranger to my lover
and he to me, it hurts so deep
I feel like the scorned kept woman
in the shoddy love triangle movies
But I am not his kept woman

Ecstatic in the absence of light
Heartbroken without the dark

I
am
a
man.

-8 June 2007-