Heron Clan: August 14, 2022, All you can Eat Revised

All You Can Eat The PGish version

It was all-you-can-eat mussels' Monday,

Vintage wallpapered we’ve all pulled down in aged apartments in our youth, 

College towns abound with mite filled plaster walled shotgun houses,

But we were older, pass that now, 

And I sat and looked at that wallpaper, 

Diamonds of tourquoise outlined with  gold Fleur-de-lis’,

Truly ugly, but magical in this hidie-hole restaurant,

Laughing, eating mussels, breaking the record of bowls ordered, 

Silly, full and sinfully contemplating another round, he said,

You know I’ve been thinking about this lady I’m working with, 

I think there’s more to it,

And I want to be open to pursue it.

He said that as I decided the wallpaper was going to be permanently indelible in my mind's eye,

Just as the taste of garlic lamb wine sauce would smack of rejection,

Innocent mussels cut off the floor of the ocean or riverbed or

wherever they lived 

Their happy lives 

Before they came to bear witness to his

Emotional infidelity,

Not bound to her, under no obligation except friendship

And the sharing of a bed

Winding down a 6 year love affair, 

They had settled in a coupling

Monogamous and exclusive

Knowing he wanted to flee,

Time again his scorpion sting 

Would make a break but grandiose ideals

Faded

And he’d return 

She’d take him back 

And they’d sit and watch Jeopardy by the artificial fireplace 

Battery candles flicker

And fruit flies flutter. 

They’d sit in an embrace not sat before in all their geriatric years,

His arm around her 

Her back against him

His hand cupping her breast 

Without intentions,

Stomachs too full from a meal. 

Here though tonight with the mussel shells piled  

The sauce glistening greasy on the dark wood table,

Concrete floor abstract art in grey,

He said he had to see where it led.

She keenly took notice of its similarity

To the designer scarf

Around his neck.

Is there a way to let the air out of your soul so many times 

That it no longer can be filled again?

Flaccid?

Their lovemaking was always thick and drenching

An endless series of toss and tumbles

But never complete

Until the time he said 

It’s not you it’s me. 

You mean I'm not the you you need me to be?

So yea it is me?

Staring at hideous mid-century colors

Eating mussels my mid-century parents brought me up on

Being dumped by a mid-century born bald man

To pursue an unshareable dream

I was never invited to dream. 

Author's Notes/Comments: 

A revised readable and not so personal as the first draft

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