Picking Up Good Vibrations

I ran into a teacher from my high school today who's glad I've been putting up poetry, and my friend who originally complained was happy about it, too. It feels good to be appreciated, and it feels great to know I'm eliciting emotion in others. Here's another. Wander on.

Girl in Sleep

Her body, still hot with sleep, invites exploration:

a new world of soft rolling hills, the deep valleys

of her waist and thighs, unseen pagan voodoo magic.

Your hand hesitates. She is still dreaming,

probably, and you want to glide over that barely visible

belly-buttoned band of skin, taste the small salt water

collected on her neck. This Carolina summer,

so early, sweltering and heavily ripe, caught the breath

in your chest--her bare shoulder called to you

like a pale dune in the night. And you beckoned back,

begging to grasp the magnolia delirium, longing

to know if this was the South her people lost

like the velvet grace of a girl's finger on her lips.

Your girl stirs, shrinking the gap between your torsos--

a space you hadn't recognized.