A Yellow Violet

Her name was Violet, 

but she always wore yellow. 

I spied her from across the room as I hesitated in the sun-framed doorway, and she was beautiful. 

She looked like her name would be Alice, but it wasn't. It was Violet, 

and she always wore yellow. 

I watched her from a distance all that day.

 She lit up the room, curls bouncing as she swayed to the music. 

I see now why she always wears yellow, 

even with a name like Violet. 

She asked me to dance. 

I wonder if this is real life (It can't be; a girl is asking me to dance), 

but it was, and I did, and we did. 

“I'm cold,” she said, 

never mind that the fire was right there, it didn't matter. 

“I'll go get my sweater,” I said.

 I raced to get it, stumbling over a tree root, scraping my bare toe, and I got my yellow sweater for her, 

but her name was Violet. 

She put it on, curls disappearing for just a moment into the tube of fabric 

now perilously close to the flame, and I stood transfixed 

at the sight of a girl named Violet wearing my yellow sweater. 

She picked up her guitar 

and there, in that place where guitar picks

fell like raindrops gently upon the moistened Earth, 

we played together at dusk. 

“Sing,” 

she said, “I know you know the words,” 

and she was right, I did, and I sang. 

And if I could have stayed in that moment forever 

with a girl named Violet wearing my yellow sweater 

I would have, 

but I can't. 

I believe people like me are not meant for yellow-sweater-wearing girls named Violet.

 But maybe, 

just maybe, 

it's not true, 

and I am meant to be here.

 Maybe this is the place where I belong, where the meadowlarks set the melody 

and the air inside my lungs is the same as the air outside my body, 

and it's the same as the air which exits her lips as she hums the tune of my favorite song, 

the same air that ruffles the curls framing her face, 

the same air that fuels the wind that blows away my sheet music – I can't find it – that doesn't matter;

 we don't need it here: 

we play from the heart. 

And I never want to leave this moment and I never do; 

I'm here forever in my mind – 

so far in my mind that I'm never actually here at all. 

And maybe it never happened. 

Maybe it never will. 

This is the danger of pretty girls named Violet who always wear yellow, especially when they can play the guitar. 

And of course, you can play music too, 

but never on a guitar, 

and your guitar picks will never fall like raindrops and land on the moistened Earth,

 no, they clatter to the ground and bounce on the linoleum. 

Yet, the creaking and screeching of the pines in the wind 

echoes the rosined tones of my bow scraping across the strings 

(and the mossy creek is filled with the same water that rolls down my cheek and lands on my fiddle as I play, 

but nobody needs to know about that, 

or about the way her voice is still echoing “sing” in my ear 

like a beam of golden sun). 

On top of the breeze, 

I can almost hear the faint chords 

played by slender fingers on a pale guitar,

and the breeze and I reminisce together 

on a girl named Violet 

who always wore yellow.