Your Eyes Never Turned My Way Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Your eyes do not answer me:
You have a lover you stare upon.
Like a hungry bird,
You put your lips to his open
Palm and give soft pecks,
Dewing his lifeline with your spittle
In which your tears catch like blue flies.
And he tames you like a skilled
Trainer, placing you
Into the better days where your life
Strokes like a teenage athlete
Warm under the sun at a swim meet.
The chlorine in the pool makes sure
Your body is clean as you
Kick your line and
Sun the shellacs you an auburn sheen
The elastic curves of your swimsuit,
Keeping your hidden flesh
The color of a whitewashed picket fence,
Punctuated by a couple roses.
You sometimes allow your eyes to
Admire your virgin flowers as you decide what
To wear to school.
Finished and placing well,
You drive away in his car.
Giving long stares to his silhouette,
You fall into his arms in a dark
And comfortable living room
Paid for in the heart of
The malaise of suburbia
You lounge and make advances toward
Love making, but only allow
Him to taste your lips,
To put his thumbprints in secret
Stamps under your clothes,
To kiss recklessly again, like
Water spilled out from buckets
Hurriedly handed from one to the next
Filled one way with gasoline
And the next water,
To first start and then put out
A fire.
You take a shower
As he cooks you brownies
And then uses his fingers to
Shovel food into your cheeks.
Wearing a towel,
You eat and
Fall asleep in his arms until he drives away.
In class you dream of him,
Through mathematics and English,
Science and social studies, your
Mind performs experimental fantasies
Starring him.
I watch you from the back corner
Of class, but you never turn my way
Or speak my name.
Your eyes have nothing to say to me,
But I see you five days a week
And the boy you always eat lunch with.
I don’t know who he is
Only that he captivates your stare
As he attracts your attention.
One day you graduated and drove away
With him. I am still standing on
The last spot I saw you,
Watching you faithfully, a senior
Lost in the labyrinth of these high
School memories
Where your eyes never turned my way.