Poetry by Jeff Oro
Art by Adri Marcano
We’re tired tourists sitting around a dinner table
drinking a slurry of orange juice and vodka.
Easy on the OJ.
You ask me for a sip of mine,
even though you have yours.
I watch your lips kiss the glass under
the sheen of the chandelier light.
Strings of dotted blue, green, red, and white
cascade down the mountain.
Cold and quiet sweep over
the snow capped village,
as day fades to night.
Hours prior, we’d been immersed in snow
until snow became pavement
and pavement turned carpet
under our battered legs.
Our laughter fills the room,
spilling out into the corridor
of the lodge. Yours is my favourite.
And through the clamour I let it
drench my ears, flowing in
and around my canals,
submerging my brain in
your soft music. My focus wanes;
I’m unsure if I should credit it
to the liquor. And in my stupor,
I watch your figure float around the table.
Goddamn she’d make a great poem.
We leave the next morning.
And in the void between then and now, I write
31 sonnets, 9 letters, 7 blank verses, and 3 dream poems
All about the kind of love
you feel for the first time
though it never lasts,
try as you might.
And I did try.
Maybe there was love in trying
or maybe it was just the cold.