CHARLIE STEAK

Still Remember

I’m headed south, struggling over the steep bypass
around Prairie Creek Redwoods, it’s late, lonely and dark.
The lanes curve and straighten and curve
in extended elegance. I constantly scan the area
in my beams for deadly elk and their lesser cousins.

Behind me, lights. Moving fast.
The highway crests and my speed improves,
but they are upon me, passing with swooping ease
one, no, two Toyota four-wheel drive pickups,
both lifted so the wheels produce the odd pleasurable effect
of being more in line than usual. They float. They skim.

They pass me within seconds of each other,
executing identical arcs, but then, ahead of me,
they zig zag back and forth, 
weaving around each other, 
flirting.

I’m convinced they were up to something,
headed to, from, excitement.
Impatience. Anticipation.
I know I’m right. 
It was thirty-four years ago
and I still remember. 

Darkness

At twilight 
the clusters of pink roses 
near the white wooden lattice 
change color.

As green thickens to black 
the open blooms become luminous,
pale softly glowing globes
suspended from night’s ear.

Now invisible, barely crushed verbena 
mingles 
with the last stray scent of jasmine.
Silence 
flows deep and wide,
all across the lawn.

The ghost 
of Virginia Woolf 
comes,
quietly,

her hair gathered in that full falling-down bun,
her face a breeze 
brushing the glimmer of petals
before they wink out 
one by one. 

Charlie Steak currently lives in the southwest USA, where he hikes a lot. The winters are great but gardening in summer resembles Armageddon (or maybe Mordor). He has written for Space 55, Synthetic Human, Rising Youth Theatre, and other organizations. His poetry has recently appeared or is forthcoming in Bluebird Word, Constellations, Dogwood Alchemy, Hare's Paw, Orion's Beau, Pinyon Poetry, Tangled Locks, and Two Hawks.