Balloon Heads
for Duke and Lisa Wells

interesting, strange
to be meeting someone
you’ve dreamed of
or seen in a magazine
in a movie or on a T.V. screen

in the flesh, in pants
in clothes too perfectly fitting
in slippers, two feet bare or almost

shy to allow my eyes
to fall down her body, too thrilling
do it surreptitiously
a time or two

wonder what laws I break to look,
to see, to behold her even clothed
in public, at an exhibition, at another

whose is she

possess who/possess what I look at
is she free to possess, mine to possess

her husband possesses a camera
possesses with a camera

has looked at other beautiful women
has snapped their pictures, their necks
pictures like picked flowers

she and I together in pitch darkness
when she snapped my picture

I one of their air heads


© Obediah Michael Smith, 2009
5:21 p.m. 21.06.09