Burning Violin

by Mima Wright
Poetry
Leonard Cohen “Dance Me to the End Of Love”

Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic ‘til I’ am gathered safely in
Lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove


June’s summer nightfall is stalking
the assiduous streets of my city.
Lavish bass-wood trees are booming
and fruiting by the seconds.
Their sweet, redolent scent is wafting
through the electric atmosphere.
My big, eleventh floor, wide open
window is flirting with the blossoms.
On the opposite side of the street,
many other windows are emitting
the light through the night,
like a hundred rectangle jars
full of fire flies,
stranded in vertical order
on the sullen concrete architecture.
My eyes are randomly snapshooting
into other people’s lives—
no, not my style—
fast, I am backing away
and stopping in awe—
a distant resonance of music from
someone else’s apartment,
is crisscrossing
the upper layers of the air:
a transparent, mellow, seductive,
soaring sound of the burning violin.
Veiled in off-white colored silk tone,
Saint Saen’s musical suite
from the Carnival of the Animals,
the Swan, demurely is infusing and
livening up my indigo kitchen.
Gently, like a zephyr,
my hand is turning off the light,
and slowly taking your olive arm,
like a precious gem of jade.
You and I, two summer
silhouettes are dancing away
from the warm reflections of the
rectangle jars full of fire flies,
and the pile of ceramic dishes
waiting patiently in the sink.

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© 2013 Fresno City College—The Review / Ram's Tale is a publication of student writing and artwork from the Humanities and Fine, Performing and Communication Arts Divisions at Fresno City College. Authors retain all rights to their work.