Love And Loss

I asked her to name her favorite season, and she answered, 'Autumn, ' without a pause for even one thought, question and answer bumping into each other. Oh, I launched into a rhapsody on that season of things ripening or already ripe, so happy that we shared the same favorite. I was foolishly voluble, talking too fast our of excitement, and, you know, nervousness. She had grown deeply silent, her head bowed, a strand of brown hair partially covering her face. I brushed it away very gently, saw her wide green eyes staring through me. She took my hand and placed it on her cheek. My voice was quiet but inspired by her response. I spoke of my love for red-gold leaves, of the clear blue sky scoured free of clouds, if the crisp taste of autumn apples, the snap of cold dawn air, long evenings with friends with a roaring fire the only light... She looked straight into my eyes, and added softly, '... And walking hand in hand along the Mississippi.' The light that emanated from her and entered me was like a first kiss held for a time past counting. And joy happened later, when we two were alone - together.... It was only later, during the wait of winter, that she admitted she only answered 'Autumn' because it was the season she least hated. And she added with peculiar bitterness, 'I hate time, because it passes, but you l-o-v-e time, you - ' So it went, and so it ended. That spotty conversation in dim winter light, more my monologue than our speech. There was already winter in her cold regard, she was anxious to make an end of hope. 'Hope is stupid, ' she said with vehemence. For an hour we sat in silence. I held her limp body loosely, and marveled at her loveliness. Then, without a word, she slipped out of my grasp, and entered a distance alone. And the distance soon became an absence, and then a memory, and then there was only me, with my love of many things.