At The New School

by Nanette Rayman

She wears a dress, unlikely existential color of strawberries, the curve of her eyes almond and agitated where they dart beneath a fringe of velvet hair. Fingertips like fawns tremble at her cheek soft as a deer’s new horn. The man she’s talking with, the philosophy professor, is also exquisite, chest muscles like sirloin breaking against his tee shirt. I remember joining thighs and lips, harbours of eyes and belly, skeletons along a black lace picket fence. He is leaning against the blackboard, she is arching in, her arms two flapping sails, and I am at the door watching this moment when her voice stumbles and drifts away. Nothing now but the sound of a dogwood branch slapping against the window, a wren pouting through the blooms. Mute. They are wondering. But not about that. About the honeysuckle opening with a sigh. Yes. About the somnolent haze of clouds. Was Nietzsche a closet romantic? But not about that. No. Never. Not about that.