Electric Velocipede Issue 25 by unknow

Author:unknow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: science fiction, fantasy, magazine
Publisher: John Klima
Published: 2012-11-20T05:00:00+00:00

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Derek Zumsteg is the only writer to ever appear in "Best American Sportswriting" (for a Bugs Bunny piece) and get a Honorable Mention in a Year's Best Science Fiction anthology (for "Ticket Inspector Gliden Becomes the First Martyr of the Glorious Human Uprising" in Asimov's). He lives and drinks in Seattle.

Upstairs Room

Lida Broadhurst

When the moon casts a candle glow,

once a year the music begins.

upstairs in the room that is always

locked, its key hidden

in Aunt Tilda’s drawer.

I never reveal how it came to me

without searching. Each year

I enter, and at my step

the room awakens, a flower

blossoming from dust.

Music arouses the sleepers

with a roar from the horns that

breathes life through the strings of a harp.

Dancing begins with a ripple,

gradually swells to a tide,

rushing shoreward, then breaking;

white hands held high seem like foam.

The gowns sway gently as petals,

held stiffly as stems in male hands.

A young girl in white without diamonds,

her hair falling finely as feathers,

dances in time to the beating of wings.

Another draped in black satin,

lace veining each seam, patterns

with slower step. Age with vigorous

needle has traced a filigree on her skin.

Round they go, unaware of my presence

as I am unaware of their urges, their

unspoken yearnings.

Seated in a corner, close to the music

and memories, the pearls and parquet

of the floor, the wines with depths

of dark jewels, I long to whirl with them,

But fearful of our hands meeting

in a useless swirl of dust,

I close the door, go downstairs

to wonder when I will be welcomed.

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