06.23.2004 - 12:30 p.m.
Wednesday
When he was a world away she braided skeins of brightly colored yarn in his name. She wove a giant tapestry proclaiming her love and she tied it to the stars. She hung her longing off the tip of a white-green crescent moon so it flapped in the breeze outside his hotel room.
When he was a world away she made a typewriter from yellow dandelions and she wrote him a story that had no ending.
She made a bonfire that burned so high, its dancing licks of flame were reflected in the Tamsui River, and he skipped flat, shining rocks across the water's burn. She blew rainbow-hued bubbles that glimmered in the midnight air and floated serenely over his bed. She danced under a noontime sun and her footsteps were turned into drumming raindrops that fell on his roof.
He inhaled in his waking morn and could smell the richness of the jasmine blooming in her world.
In her dreams she flew, over the ocean's stretch, over a carpet of constellations, over mountains and over farmlands, until she could see his face. She spoke his name in silence and he heard.
When he was a world away she strung bells in the uppermost branches of forest pines that rang for him hourly. Salted winds blew through his windows and brought faint evergreen chimes on their curlicued gusts. An earth-toned bird sang in his sky, a black-capped bird sang in hers.
She sewed thunderclaps together and flung them outward, a lightening-strewn net to catch his uneasy dreams and replace them with warm grassy fields, sun-ripened fruits, snow topped mountains, the laughter of children.
He drew her name on a piece of paper, folded it five times, and tossed it in the air, where it disappeared in a shower of golden sparks. In her world, five candles lit at once, and burned a thick floral scent that made her smile.
She felt their magnet-pull across the miles, and wished him a safe journey back through time, back across the sea, back to her. When he was a world away.
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