Victorian Lady
Curious the way she tilts her head, the even arches of her eyes, the pale blue shadow over just the one. One eye, over the porch, takes you in; the other - curtains primarily drawn - holds one back. With appropriate decorum, the lady will permit you to enter. Knock or ring the bell, but never too loudly. Come into my living room, she says. We will be cautious with the amount of light, the upper curtains open only at a slight angle. No one will be able to hear of what we speak. The conversation between us is as if we hold a pale blue, ceramic bowl of ripe, dark red cherries. Note how the slice of sunlight silvers their skins. We speak in slow measure, calibrating each moment’s taste. Yes, indeed, we live in a different century. Sustained by the architect’s careful geometries - the arches - we pleasure in restraint, the art of slow disclosure. If you are anxious, as some are, be calm. No one dies here. This is not eternity. If you will, however, please care for the memory: voices carefully joined, a resonance - dark varnished interior woods, the imagination, the slow carpentry that defines us.
Victorian house on 21st. Street, between Guerrero & Valencia, San Francisco