We were in a meadow.
You wore a sundress.
We spent the day there,
chasing dreams we
saw in clouds.

In our revery, shaded
within tall green grass,
scents of thyme and
rosemary you told me
were sweetspire and
buttonbush. Fragrances
lovely enough to inspire
certain bravery in me;
enough for me to ask
you more..

Until we discovered we
were not alone in the
meadow, as the third
exposed himself from
behind an oak tree.
With his gruesome head,
and his matted hair.
His penis in his hand.

To it you shrieked the most
awful sound of sheer terror
I’d ever heard.

It made the man smile.
“Go ahead. Do it already!”
As he licked his lips, and said
things, most of which was
incomprehensible, as he
pulled himself with increasing
aggression.

Holding you, you shed a tear.
I felt it press against my cheek.
While I was awestruck and
reticent to the sight of this
maniac who masturbated
before us, I could not muster
so much as a sound, or gasp.
I did not even blink.

What transpired, as a squirrel
descended the oak tree’s bough,
onto the man’s naked shoulder,
and to the ground, and vanished;
the man was affectless to this
creature, as if he himself were
but a tree, but an object, but
a part of the landscape; I had
never felt envy for an animal
until I wished we both could be
it, in that one strange moment;
as the placidity of a man who
as clear as the very day itself
wanted nothing but to harm us.

He produced a knife.