artwork: ralph murre
The Moroccan Leather
Briefcase
by Jackie
Langetieg
What
I really wanted that day,
handling
the soft Moroccan leather,
was
to be a person who went to Morocco
or
Egypt , or Kashmir —someplace
exotic,
where
a man in a white flowing burnoose
with
black and silver ropes would see I was lost
and
offer to lead me back to my people and
on
the way, we stop at a dark café, sip
strong
coffee poured from a long-handled carafe
into
small brass cups filigreed with whirls
of
romantic Arabic, and tell each other our mysteries.
His
robes flow over his body. His
lean
brown fingers stroke my hand; I quiver
as
desire pools in my belly. His neat black beard raises
tiny
hairs on my neck; then his lips begin at the crevice
of
my scapula skip down to my clavicle, around
my
breasts, and slowly trace an untraceable path
to
my navel. Clothes frantically tossed
onto
a rattan chair, bodies
clasped
together . . . what!
Do
I want to buy the briefcase?
Yes,
yes, yes.
~
first published in Confetti in a Silent
City
