About Stranger
Stranger. Fascinating, strangers are, they're the people who you walk past every day yet may never know. The stranger who you see across the street on a busy morning with the crisp bite of the snow falling around your feet. The stranger is the one always holding her coffee in her right hand with her coat pulled close to keep out the chill. You wish you had a name to the beautiful stranger who stands huddled at the bus stop with her coffee and coat. You'll see her every day when you leave your apartment. Maybe if you waved she'd wave back. You see each other every day after all. She wouldn't wave back, of course, she doesn't recognize you, You're just another stranger. The snow will melt and the trees will sprout green buds and you'll see the stranger. You'll see the stranger and you'll reach out and as she's getting on the bus you'll wave and she won't see. Of course, it was just bad timing, you try to tell yourself, but maybe the stranger did see and why would the weird girl across the street who always comes out of her apartment at the same time every morning be waving at her. You're probably the weird girl in her mind. She probably knows you've got nowhere to be this early and you're always just looking for her. She knows. She doesn't. How could she? So you try again. Walk out. See the girl. Wave. Miss. You leave earlier in a desperate attempt to see the stranger, to name the stranger. Walk out. See the girl. Wave. Miss. Repeat. She's got to be ignoring you now. She has to be. In a last ditch attempt, you jog across the street attempting to avoid getting hit because how embarrassing would that be? You reach the girl. Up close you can see the freckles that dance across her pale cheeks and you can see the bright green speckled around the blue in her eyes. You become breathless as she smiles, her eyes light up and she's the most beautiful girl you've ever seen. Before you can say a word your stranger beats you to it with a bright greeting that sounds like music, and just like that your stranger isn't a stranger anymore.
Red.
Red.
Red is what you feel when you see the one you adore. They are sitting on the kitchen counter at one on the morning with messy hair and a bowl of cereal and you feel red.
Red is what you feel when their body is pulled towards you and you feel the flame that you've kindled together. You want them, you feel red.
Red is what you feel alongside the rose they present you with. They smile and bring the red to their cheeks and yours, you feel red.
Red is what you feel when you kneel in front of them with the rock on a circle of silver saying, 'Will you be red with me for the rest of our lives' when they say yes, you feel red.
Red is what you feel when your first little one cries for the first time and you know that you'll protect that child with everything in and out of your power, you feel red.
Red is what you feel when the one you adore starts yet another screaming match. You yell and yell and the cheeks once red from the roses are now red from the harsh words, you feel red.
Red is what you feel when you come home and everything's different. Another's clothes have been discarded down the hall on the way to the bedroom and as you throw open the red-painted door you know that this is it and every other form of red was leading to this, to the worst of the reds. The lovely reds always end in the ugly reds as you see them caught up with another's flame. That used to be your flame, and that used to be your rose, and that used to be your bowl of cereal at one in the morning. The rock with the silver is tucked away, they didn't need it for this purpose, it would have just gotten in the way. The screaming matches take on a whole new rearing form of a beast and you feel red.
Red is what you feel when you gather your clothes and your favorite book, your roses and the rock, your bowl of cereal and the flame, and the little red child. You pack these things as they beg you not to leave. It was a red mistake, they say. You feel red when you let them go.
Red.
Bodies over Minds
Dictionaries define lust as strong sexual attraction. Lust is the hell-bent version of love. We feel lust when we fall in love with the body rather than the mind. You can feel lust for the one you love but not love for the one you lust for. Love songs describe lust. We tend to confuse lust with love. We fall for the bodies not the minds. That is lust.