Next Best Thing

 

It was perpetual summer, richly fragrant with potent mary jane and pungent patchouli.

I was sixteen.

She was two years older – so far out of my league that she should never have even noticed me.  And yet somehow I was there, amazed at my good fortune, hopelessly in love with her, and in complete awe of her friends. They were ultra-hip, achingly cool and comfortably rich.

Whereas I owned the Levi’s I stood up in, a couple of faded shirts, a borrowed guitar, and my notebook of spidery poems.

There was a gentle candle-lit dinner party in one of daddy’s spare houses.  The room was beamed and flagged and full of style and music. I was a pretty boy – an amusing novelty to wear like a trinket on her arm.  Although I never realised that at the time.

The conversation turned to views of what a perfect partner might be.  She waxed lyrical about what would excite her.  Intelligence, a sense of humour, a slim, slender physique, a writer, a revolutionary, a mass of golden curls, eyes that could both command and romance.  I swear she was looking at me. I thought she was talking about me.  I was young, proud and special.  I had smoked perhaps a little too much dope.

‘Thank you.’ I said, when she had finished.

There was a moment of stunned silence before the table erupted with mocking laughter.  She reached across and patted my hand.

‘Oh, darling boy.  Did you think I meant you?’

I lowered my eyes, blushing fiercely, almost tearful at my own stupidity.

‘Don’t worry,’ she consoled me. ‘you are the next best thing.’  There was more laughter.

It was an instructive and humbling moment that I promised myself I would never forget.

It still lives on, all these years later, in my e-mail address:

nextthing@_________

.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

I first posted this in 2012 writing about a memory of my teens that never faded. I suspect we have all had moments like these in our formative years

Photograph by Matt Eaton

 

Words in the rain

 

Thunder rumbles again.

The day has darkened and rain is falling. Pale silver threads against a backdrop of green-black trees.

It is June. Only days away from the solstice. Here in leafy England, the nights will soon begin their slow, steady, inevitable drawing in.

The sun shone bravely this morning. In my secluded, fragrant garden, I sipped tea and listened to bees buzzing, to the gurgle of water in the pond, and to an insistent song in my head that would not stop playing.

And now, at my ancient oak desk in this far more ancient room, on this quiet, directionless, stranded afternoon, I cannot remember the words.

I want to write, but I have no words at all.

I notice I have just absent-mindedly typed your name onto the page. I stare at it in pleased surprise. It is as if you had just whispered my name. I delete it. You are beyond secrecy. Only you will ever know about you.

The thunder is closer.

It sounds like warfare, the moving of celestial furniture, the roaring of mythical gods. Unexpectedly a bird is singing in the midst of it all.

I think about you. Not in any structured way. Where you are. What you are doing. What you are wearing. What you are thinking.

I hope, hopelessly, it is about me.

I think about your beauty, your body, your eyes, your mouth, the elegance of your shoulders, the shape of your breasts. For a few moments, my mind wanders down paths divinely carnal. I sigh at my own predictability. And at the holding of my breath.

You are so far away. Always.

The thunder is passing. Weakening, Grumbling and groaning in a more distant part of the sky. The rain is easing. The single bird has become a small chorus.

I stare at my page. I have written nothing.

But, sweet angel, I wrote it for you.

.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

Art by Thomas Saliot

 

Next Best Thing

 

It was perpetual summer, richly fragrant with potent mary jane and pungent patchouli.

I was sixteen.

She was two years older – so far out of my league that she should never have even noticed me.  And yet somehow I was there, amazed at my good fortune, hopelessly in love with her, and in complete awe of her friends. They were ultra-hip, achingly cool and comfortably rich.

Whereas I owned the Levi’s I stood up in, a couple of faded shirts, a borrowed guitar, and my notebook of spidery poems.

There was a gentle candle-lit dinner party in one of daddy’s spare houses.  The room was beamed and flagged and full of style and music. I was a pretty boy – an amusing novelty to wear like a trinket on her arm.  Although I never realised that at the time.

The conversation turned to views of what a perfect partner might be.  She waxed lyrical about what would excite her.  Intelligence, a sense of humour, a slim, slender physique, a writer, a revolutionary, a mass of golden curls, eyes that could both command and romance.  I swear she was looking at me. I thought she was talking about me.  I was young, proud and special.  I had smoked perhaps a little too much dope.

‘Thank you.’ I said, when she had finished.

There was a moment of stunned silence before the table erupted with mocking laughter.  She reached across and patted my hand.

‘Oh, darling boy.  Did you think I meant you?’

I lowered my eyes, blushing fiercely, almost tearful at my own stupidity.

‘Don’t worry,’ she consoled me. ‘you are the next best thing.’  There was more laughter.

It was an instructive and humbling moment that I promised myself I would never forget.

It still lives on, all these years later, in my e-mail address:

nextthing@_________

.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

I first posted this in 2012 writing about a memory of my teens that never faded. I suspect we have all had moments like these in our formative years

Photograph by Matt Eaton

 

I wrote poems for you

 

I wrote poems for you

.

I wrote poems for you.

Some were bold, burnished, bright.

They praised your beauty, your body.

Burning for your

brilliant mind.

.

I wrote poems for you.

Some were sweet, silky, soft.

They were sensual, sexual, seductive.

Seeking to steal

your sacred heart.

.

I wrote poems for you.

Some were yearning, wanting, craving.

They were aching, thirsting, needing,

Longing to draw you

into my arms.

.

I wrote poems for you.

But they were just wasted

unwanted words.

You were always

someone else’s girl.

.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

This the fourth outing for this poem written four years ago – no reason for reposting, except that I like it.

Art by Fabian Perez

 

Perhaps one day ….

 

I have her beauty hard-wired into me

I have known it forever.

My first school boy fantasies were of her. She has never changed. The same hair, eyes, mouth, chin, nose. The same height, weight, posture and stance. The same shoulders, breasts, hips, arse and thighs.

The same mix of swagger and vulnerability, of shyness and chatter, of independence and submission, of contemplation and fun

Her beauty is burned into my soul.

And I have found her

and owned her.

Once, twice, even three times.

Almost.

Never.

I keep believing. Although my time here is running out.

Perhaps one day ….

.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

Art by Harding Meyer

This is not new. I posted it around this time four years ago, and once each year since. But do indulge me. Oh, and the painting does not reflect the ‘beauty hard wired into me’. It is simply a piece of art I like.

 

Next Best Thing

 

It was perpetual summer, richly fragrant with potent mary jane and pungent patchouli.

I was sixteen.

She was two years older – so far out of my league that she should never have even noticed me.  And yet somehow I was there, amazed at my good fortune, hopelessly in love with her, and in complete awe of her friends. They were ultra hip, achingly cool and comfortably rich.

Whereas I owned the Levi’s I stood up in, a couple of faded shirts, a borrowed guitar, and my notebook of spidery poems.

There was a gentle candle-lit dinner party in one of daddy’s spare houses.  The room was beamed and flagged and full of style and music. I was a pretty boy – an amusing novelty to wear like a trinket on her arm.  Although I never realised that at the time.

The conversation turned to views of what a perfect partner might be.  She waxed lyrical about what would excite her.  Intelligence, a sense of humour, a slim, slender physique, a writer, a revolutionary, a mass of golden curls, eyes that could both command and romance.  I swear she was looking at me. I thought she was talking about me.  I was young, proud and special.  I had smoked perhaps a little too much dope.

‘Thank you.’ I said, when she had finished.

There was moment of stunned silence before the table erupted with mocking laughter.  She reached across and patted my hand.

‘Oh, darling boy.  Did you think I meant you?’

I lowered my eyes, blushing fiercely, almost tearful at my own stupidity.

‘Don’t worry,’ she consoled me. ‘you are the next best thing.’  There was more laughter.

It was an instructive and humbling moment that I promised myself I would never forget.

It still lives on, all these years later, in my e-mail address:

nextthing@_________

.

.

As I continue to go through pieces of my past, I found this. I first posted it in 2012 writing about a memory of my teens that never faded. I suspect we have all had moments like these in our formative years.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

Photograph by Matt Eaton

 

Perhaps one day

 

I have her beauty hard-wired into me

I have known it forever.

My first school boy fantasies were of her. She has never changed. The same hair, eyes, mouth, chin, nose. The same height, weight, posture and stance. The same shoulders, breasts, hips, arse and thighs.

The same mix of swagger and vulnerability, of shyness and chatter, of independence and submission, of contemplation and fun

Her beauty is burned into my soul.

And I have found her

and owned her.

Once, twice, even three times.

Almost.

Never.

I keep believing. Although my time here is running out.

Perhaps one day ….

.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

Art by Harding Meyer

This is not new. I posted it around this time three years ago, and once each year since. But do indulge me. Oh, and the painting does not reflect the ‘beauty hard wired into me’. It is simply a piece of art I like.

 

If by poetry

 

If by poetry

 

If

by poetry

I can make her

flesh and blood

my body on which to press

I will forge

such compelling words

her hungry soul

to steal

.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

Art by Cesar Santos

I originally tweeted these words over three years past, but liked them so much I elevated them to a blog post two years ago. If elevate is the right word. I hope you don’t mind them again. It is one of my favourite short poems.

 

 

In my youth

A girl like you.

In my youth I would have fought other boys for the right to walk you home. Wearing the scars like a badge. Or I would have wandered backwards and forwards past your house , hoping to catch a glimpse of you at a window. Or long for you to see me, a shadowy figure beneath the street light, and think me romantic.

In my youth I would have carved presumptuous initials into innocent trees, into battered park benches, into tables, and desks, and the backs of chairs – not caring if I was caught. Or that you would disapprove if you knew.

In my youth I would have sought you out at dances, making a mess of my over rehearsed lines. I would have asked a friend to give you messages – which you would probably receive with a frown.

In my youth I would have made up a hundred heroic stories in my head where I come to your rescue. Saving you from the clutches of the mob, the grip of an assailant, the jaws of death. Or perhaps just finding your lost dog.

In my youth I would have written you tortured poems, toiled over for hours, scrawled on stolen paper, that would never leave the pocket of my faded denim jeans.

In my youth I would have wished for the internet, if I could have seen into the future.

Yet here I am. Connection at my fingertips. Posting pointless poetry.

That you will probably never read

A girl like you.

.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

Written a year ago, and I am still posting pointless poetry.

Art by Annick Bouvattier

 

Walks this earth

 

There is a woman.

She walks this earth.

I have not met her, although I once came close. I have barely seen her, though glimpses have thrilled me. I have never spoken to her, although I swear I can hear her sweet accent in my head. And in my dreams.

I do not know her perfume but her scent thrills me. I have not touched her but can almost feel her skin beneath my finger tips. I have not looked into her eyes, but feel light-headed at the thought.

I have not owned her, but the hunger to do so consumes me.

There is a woman.

She walks this earth.

.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

Art by Steve Hanks

This is by no means new. I wrote it at least three years old. It has been plagiarised a number of times, which I am told is a compliment.  I like it very much. And one thing I do know for certain – there is a woman who walks the earth….