A Goddess in Purple Rain

by Cynthia Atkins

Behind glass, a lady is lit-up inside the laundromat.

She’s folding sheets, pink curlers of baroque

in her hair, singing and creasing

a t-shirt with sequins. Her arms and hips stretch out

to a body of air—the room filling with sound.

And I am humming inside her—inside her body,

burning for shelter from the abyss

                          of my alone. Rounding a corner

in a car, I am passing by, hearing “Purple Rain”

on the radio—I can almost taste

the sweat on the brow of the boy I danced with

so many years ago—It tasted like dry toast

                          or the brunt of hurting. 

Listen to the sky imploring, Come as you are—

Alone to the last concert, to light matches

in a spell-bound crowd—Remorse of loving

a rock star we can never own.  And now the lady

in the laundromat is swaying, and I am swaying

with her from my car—Maybe she is dancing with her son,

going off to boot camp, or the ends of the earth.  

                        I’m thinking of my son at three,

standing on the kitchen table in a wet diaper,

banging music from a wooden spoon.

This is that concert, where you lit a match

to your own bag of wounds.  You felt like

                        you belonged, a citizen.

Alive as a hackle of girls at the May prom. 

Look at the moon, hanging like a shoe

to throw its heel of light

                on the page or an empty field.

We are all in the body of this night, cogent as a judge

who loves the law.  The lady in the laundromat

carries the load to her car, unpins her hair.

I don’t want to be alone tonight.  The stars allow

me to follow her— we are passing the town,

rooftops are hunkering down to sing

lullabies to the young, and the night

is a stranger touching my sleeve. 

* * * * *

"A Goddess in Purple Rain" was first published in Hermeneutic Chaos.

Cynthia Atkins is the author of Psyche’s Weathers and In the Event of Full Disclosure, and the forthcoming collection “Still-Life With God.” Her poems have appeared in numerous journals, including, Alaska Quarterly Review, Apogee, BOMB, Cleaver Magazine, Cultural Weekly, Denver Quarterly, Diode, Florida Review, Flock Lit, Green Mountains Review, Le Zaporogue, Los Angeles Review, North American Review, Rust + Moth, Sweet: A Literary Confection, SWWIM, Tampa Review, and Verse Daily, and have been nominated for Pushcart and Best of The Net. Formerly, Atkins worked as the assistant director of the Poetry Society of America. She has received fellowships from Bread Loaf and the VCCA. Atkins teaches creative writing at Blue Ridge Community College and lives on the Maury River of Rockbridge County VA with her family. More on @catkinspoet www.cynthiaatkins.com, https://www.facebook.com/Cynthia-Atkins-190490067665164/-