Margie’s Gone


Too cool for August. Hard rain slices the evening crosswise, exposing its
entrails. I wonder where Margie and her white mouse have gone, her frank and
cuddly passions probably long expended, her pet long expired. She taught me
to tap-dance ten years ago when tap-dancers were in demand; but stage-shy, I
never performed in public.

Still, we had hot times in the clammy parking garage under the mall.
Pneumatic bliss, T.S. Eliot called it. Too bad he enjoyed so little of it
himself. His moral deliberation spoiled everything his Anglican forefinger
touched. Too bad he never touched Margie’s engrossing and friendly organs.

Margie’s gone and the rain’s angry against the windows. Too clumsy for
tap-dancing, I squeeze the book I’m reading so hard a few words pop off the
page and disintegrate in stagnant air. Off to bed, where I dream of Margie
sailing through marbled reddish skies, her elegance ageless, her hair the
same neutral beige she earned at birth, her orange eyes brimming with tears
of naïve sexual pleasure.

Margie loved her body as much as men did. It flowered in elementary school
while the rest of us played marbles or jacks. It fit her so well and yet was
unexceptional other than in comfort. I wake to utter silence. The house
holds its breath while I realize I’ve never known anyone named Margie but
wish that I had: her ease and warmth soothing to an ego grown callous with
disuse.