Or How Could He Ever Win The Heart of Any Woman? by Hedy Habra

Dead Leaves, by Remedios Varo (Mexico, b. Spain) 1956.

Or How Could He Ever Win The Heart of Any Woman?
                                   
She shuffled seasons at will, carpeted her floors with grass and wildflowers, picked the first man who showed her a spark of kindness and carved his heart in her own image. Words danced in vibrant hues over the pages of her diary, giving life to a silhouette hovering in half tones in midst of the grisaille. With an empty stare, she’d sit for hours, see his shadow kneel in front of her, listen to his fading merman’s song.
 
She’d redress his crossed eyes, bent shoulders and slight limp, or else, how could he ever win the heart of any woman? She thought of Beauty and the Beast, although he was no beast and she was no beauty. Until the day she flung windows wide open, let gusts invade the rooms, let her skin bear the colors of dead leaves, and knew time had come to pull the thread, unravel the feelings spun around his heart.

Hedy Habra

This poem was first published by Gargoyle.
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Hedy Habra has authored three poetry collections, most recently, The Taste of the Earth (Press 53 2019). Tea in Heliopolis won the USA Best Book Award and was finalist for the International Book Award, and Under Brushstrokes was finalist for the USA Best Book Award and the International Book Award. Her story collection, Flying Carpets, won the Arab American Book Award’s Honorable Mention and was finalist for the Eric Hoffer Award. A fourteen-time nominee for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, her work appears in Cimarron Review, Bitter Oleander, Fifth Wednesday Journal, Drunken Boat, Gargoyle, Nimrod, Poet Lore, and Verse Daily. Her website is hedyhabra.com