Girl with the golden hair

Something new to tide you over, I'm working on a few poems and a short story. It's about a sailor. Who doesn't like sailors? Let me know what you think. As always, I appreciate that any of you read this stuff!

You are sitting in a bar in Rome, on leave from the war. Your glass of wine has yet to be emptied. Your eyes scan the room, a pleasant buzzing fills your head as the conversations of a foreign tongue wash over you. You begin to turn back to your fellow soldiers, but a flash of light catches your attention. You see her from across the room, a simple meeting of the eyes. Your heart begins to beat faster, your mind swells beyond the realm of possibilities. Here, now, this is all there is. We will never be more perfect than in this moment of true understanding. Life, death, fear, hope, love, loss, wonder, despair, power, weakness. All are wrapped in the sensation of seeing the only one who will ever understand the true depth of your buried life. You contemplate talking to her, but even looking is enough to make you feel impertinent. You try in vain to summon the words that will fall on her ears like snowflakes, dancing in and out her mind as delicately as the flower she is. But you can’t. You do not have the capacity to make plain your emotions, because she defies all of that. All you can do is show her your passion. Show her that you are more than you appear, more than she can know right now. Her eyes are like sapphire jewels, catching the lamplight and throwing it back, multiplied a thousand times in its splendor. Her smile cuts you. Your mind is a jumble, a swirling mass of was, is, will be. Pray, pray to God that she will reciprocate the unequivocal, unlocutable feelings that swell within your chest.  You speak, a mass of garbled nouns and verbs and descriptives.

“Hi. So. I saw you from across the room and you are so beautiful and I had to tell you my name. And. It’s uh, Michael. Umm so are you from here?”

She smiles, seeing the Truth in you, the being that begs to leap forth and be her only solace.

“My name is Elena. I’m glad you came up to me Michael, but I have to go. I will see you soon though.”

“How do you know?”

“This is your first time in Rome yes?” You nod vigorously. “Then do as the Romans do.” She flashes her perfectly crooked smile and spins off, leaving you alone and at the same time with the overwhelming knowledge you would see her again.

You measure her pressing presence in the absence of her essence, feeling again the faculties lost, floundering in the facets of her face. Your mind turns to war, to death, to loss. How can you bring her into this world of pain? But you know she is the one to drag you out of hell’s fire. She is the one to shatter the devil and to bring you through the door of Orpheus. Your heart says, “Hang on to this one. She’s the only chance you’ll have.” This woman you don’t know is the one to emancipate your endless incarceration.  She has reached into the currents of your buried life and made plain your own soul. This is it. You have taken the plunge, and all it took was looking 10 inches to the right. You have fallen in love with the girl with the golden hair, and it took no more time than the space of a heartbeat.