Never have I seen such sublime matching as your
Burberry wellies and black keffiyeh. also your
paisley bag and houndstooth jacket look nice together.

Will you bake me fresh cookies in the rain while dancing frenzily to Mogwai yes?
No well that's ok too then I will accompany you on your French thirties bike with the
woven basket int he front with a little Terrier puppy riding along with a single daisy in his teeth
who you have named Arthur.
Like Conan Doyle? I ask.
No. Rimbaud.

Boy your sunglasses sure are big I say. You must need a comprehensive UV protection package.
Slap. That hurts. hurts so good like little shimmering diamonds of forever raining down on me from a
Cloud of compressed carbonate matter of your love. Was that good?
No. OK well I can try better you know, I didn't spend all night writing it or anything. you know I was being all spontaneous-like, that's what you like, isn't it? Hey isn't it? Isn't it? hey, come back? Where are you going my precious? Back to the lair for more planning.

the next morning I show up on your door with an indian headdress and a bright yellow raincoat. Oh, sorry. Sorry. Ok I didn't know you are one-sixteenth Seminole and your great-grandmother Charlotte, who you are named after, died in the fabled Triangle Raincoat Factory fire of 1907. Well how the fuck was I supposed to know that anyway? It was kinda spontaneous though wasn't it? No? It was dumb? Well that's a matter of opinion, really, the line is very blurry you know.

Movement from behind the door. Is that Keith? It'd better not be Keith. Oh how I hate Keith. He appears. Hey looking good Devan, he says with a smile. You know we're just about to go out for breakfast at
our local Jewish eatery. Want to come.

Oh God I hate hate hate hate hate you Keith. Never in a million years will I go with you and eat
blintzes and reubens and whatever the hell else you eat at a place like that. Hey, why don't you come along asks my Love. It'd be fun.

The emphyzemic waitress has trouble asking me my order, in between fits of laughter-induced coughing at
my garb. Um, I'll have, uh, Uncle Shlomo's #2 special. Hold the pickles.


==========================================================================

Charlotte looked at me strangely. "What's wrong with you?"

I was rapt in a dreamy demi-stare into her moist, crystalline eyeballs, windows into her inner optical nerve.

"Oh, nothing. I was just..."

Questioning eyes now. "Just what?"

"You know, contemplating eternity in your arms. Forever."

A grimace crossed over sweet Charlotte's face.

"What distasteful countenance has crossed your fine, divine features my love? My liege????"

She pointed to her throat. "I just puked in my mouth, a little. Nothing to worry about."

Damned if that didn't turn me on. "Must I immortalize your blessed bile with a poem? Or perhaps a wicked guitar riff on my electronic guitar?"

Charlotte sighed. "Guitar riff, I guess."

=========================================================================

Later that night, she looked at me, rapt and all-encompassing.

"You know, I'm getting a little tired of these...you know. These constant displays of-"

"Of what? Of my undying love for you? Of my immaculately crafted poetry lying next to your bed each and every morning welcoming you into a fresh new summer's day? Of the rose petals that cover every square inch of our downtown, inner city, 30's-style 1-bdrm. apartment?"

Charlotte nodded. "That, and-"

"And what? My precious words of forever, forever, telling you what is, what will be, and what ought to be?"

Sighs. "You're just not getting it, Devan. I value the...value of love. Absolutely. But writing godawful poetry about my, you know, my BMs..."

"'The pungent scent of meals enjoyed/Give earthy blessings to our home.' Yes, I rather liked that line myself."

"Look. I don't need to hear it to know it. And the irony is, I guess, the more you tell me it, the less I believe it. Now, I'm sure that you believe I'm the Isis to your Osiris, and that any other girl you've...consummated with is such rubbish compared to me-"

"'Never have I felt such a deep, existential, primordial connection between two living souls locked together now, and for eternity, forever, two paths converging and merging into a great two-tone rainbow of the future.' I made that up, just now."

I was rather pleased with myself. "Yes, well" Charlotte said. "Be that as it may, it perhaps underscores my point that you're, what, twenty?"

"Twenty and-a-half" I said proudly.

"Right. I'm...well, older. And while the first six hundred deliveries of Azaleas to my office was endearing, there comes a point when one has to say, uh, um..."

"What? That I love you double? Triple? Not quadruple...hey, the 'Fourth Dimension of Love', that's a good song name. Let me get my gui-"

"NO." That was more forceful than Charlotte was used to. "Look. You've flooded me with cheap, sugary, tear-inducing (but not in the good way) poetry lately. For a long time, actually. And let me tell you, I get it. You love me. I fucking get it. But...but..."

"But what, O Rose of the North?" I said. "Must I not write about the items of yours I find in my pocket, like your dragonfly necklace, at work, and how it brings o sweet tears of joy and longing to my face that I would be with you, carnally, and nakedly, together at that very moment, a sigularity of space-time existence that never happens again???"

Sweet Charlotte got up and walked away. As she left the room, she looked back at me.

"I'm sorry, Devan. It's...I just can't take this anymore. It's over."

All I managed was a muffled gurgle. How poetic.