The Toothless Buddha

Gibran and Basho served with pork loin and apple chutney was how he lured the younger gals to come to his place on Friday nights. (He was fifty and had marched with King in Alabama, so when I say "younger" I mean they were in their 30s). I only went because my girlfriend had been invited and I knew that if I didn't he'd be all over her. During dinner, he read a little from The Prophet. "I am in the heart of God." I wept in my food. Then I asked him if he'd teach me how to write poetry (I'd bring him to Native sweat lodges in return). Years later, we were at a picnic table listening to Gorecki's "Third Symphony: Sorrowful Songs."  We were both older, but especially him---staring at a few starlings in the bare silver maples and the autumn hills with their shadows. Earth was only a tumbleweed.

to insulate myself            

from the brutal cold

a woman I do not know