{"id":641,"date":"2016-11-17T01:30:26","date_gmt":"2016-11-17T01:30:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/?p=641"},"modified":"2025-04-21T13:40:35","modified_gmt":"2025-04-21T13:40:35","slug":"she-fled-him-down-the-days","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/2016\/11\/17\/she-fled-him-down-the-days\/","title":{"rendered":"SHE FLED HIM DOWN THE DAYS"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

(with a nod to Francis Thompson)<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

She ran<\/strong><\/p>\n

She fled<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was Maleness to her<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was Strength<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was deep sexual Lust<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She ran from him<\/strong><\/p>\n

She rented a cottage near Misquamicut Beach*<\/strong><\/p>\n

And stayed there the entire off season<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was Intellect to her<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was Art and Creativity<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was dusty books<\/strong><\/p>\n

That he fed to her<\/strong><\/p>\n

In snacks, in meals<\/strong><\/p>\n

In three- course dinners<\/strong><\/p>\n

In after- hours nightcaps <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She fled him down the days<\/strong><\/p>\n

And took a new life by the ocean<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

There were those who came to see her<\/strong><\/p>\n

There were those she would not see<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She hid from him<\/strong><\/p>\n

And all his Masculine Virtue<\/strong><\/p>\n

Truth and Philosophy<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She did not want his embrace?<\/strong><\/p>\n

She did not want his kiss?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She did want it<\/strong><\/p>\n

But she resisted it<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She resisted it like torture<\/strong><\/p>\n

With all her might<\/strong><\/p>\n

She found a cold spot within her<\/strong><\/p>\n

And she rested there in a fetal position<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She fled<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She didn\u2019t tell him she had left<\/strong><\/p>\n

She didn\u2019t leave a note<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She ran<\/strong><\/p>\n

The car was old and unsafe<\/strong><\/p>\n

She filled the tank and fled<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She covered herself in sweaters and scarves<\/strong><\/p>\n

She didn\u2019t care it was a blistery cold night<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She fled him down the days<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Escaping into the wicked reverie of dreams<\/strong><\/p>\n

She now dared<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The winter was brutal and unrelenting<\/strong><\/p>\n

The wind a sour scourge<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She didn\u2019t care<\/strong><\/p>\n

She lit a fire and waited<\/strong><\/p>\n

She lit a fire alone<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

There were no electronics<\/strong><\/p>\n

There was only a wind- up clock<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Torn rugs and chipped dishes<\/strong><\/p>\n

A tiny kitchen to sip her coffee<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Drapes that never quite closed<\/strong><\/p>\n

Windows never quite down<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Rooms half painted<\/strong><\/p>\n

With old smells<\/strong><\/p>\n

From former inhabitants<\/strong><\/p>\n

And their pets<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She fled<\/strong><\/p>\n

She ran<\/strong><\/p>\n

She hid<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

He had unearthed her lust<\/strong><\/p>\n

He had drowned her in his passion<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

No lover came near him<\/strong><\/p>\n

No rival on the shelf<\/strong><\/p>\n

No rival on the horizon<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was Sex God<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was Mind<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was Artist<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She ran from him<\/strong><\/p>\n

Into the underworld of her fears<\/strong><\/p>\n

She dove<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Like a mermaid<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Living by the sea in savage solitude<\/strong><\/p>\n

Gazing into fires<\/strong><\/p>\n

Gazing into herself<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Writing graffiti to eternity<\/strong><\/p>\n

With her toes in the white sand<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She spent the entire off season<\/strong><\/p>\n

There<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

(the butt of jokes; the object of gossip)<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

They would see her in her sweaters<\/strong><\/p>\n

And in her scarves<\/strong><\/p>\n

And know her fire was lit at night<\/strong><\/p>\n

While waves crashed and boomed<\/strong><\/p>\n

And wind waffled and whistled<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

They\u2019d see her shadow on the walls<\/strong><\/p>\n

And wonder who she was<\/strong><\/p>\n

And where she came from<\/strong><\/p>\n

And what lover she had fled<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

What love that had been so vast<\/strong><\/p>\n

And uplifting, now rolling out with the tide<\/strong><\/p>\n

Like a dingy without a sail<\/strong><\/p>\n

Without a compass or a map<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She fled him down the days<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

One unsafe car<\/strong><\/p>\n

And a full tank of gas<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She hid<\/strong><\/p>\n

She ran<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

He never saw her again<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

He wrote her letters<\/strong><\/p>\n

He sent her cards<\/strong><\/p>\n

He slapped all his love on paper<\/strong><\/p>\n

And splattered it in her face<\/strong><\/p>\n

He vowed endless declarations<\/strong><\/p>\n

He promised the impossible, sincerely<\/strong><\/p>\n

He reminded her of ecstatic evenings<\/strong><\/p>\n

And lovemaking days of no end<\/strong><\/p>\n

He drew sketches that revealed her body to him<\/strong><\/p>\n

He painted enormous murals of her<\/strong><\/p>\n

And filled the city with them<\/strong><\/p>\n

He forced her memory wide open<\/strong><\/p>\n

He pried passed the flames into her frozen heart<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She wept and howled with her face near the fire<\/strong><\/p>\n

She screamed into the waves<\/strong><\/p>\n

And kicked the sand as she bellowed<\/strong><\/p>\n

She crashed to the earth while wrestling a sea gull<\/strong><\/p>\n

And fell asleep in a dreamless land<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She fled him down the days<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not out of love<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not out of hate<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not out of indifference<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

She fled him down the days<\/strong><\/p>\n

Because<\/strong><\/p>\n

Once when they stood in a mirror<\/strong><\/p>\n

Together<\/strong><\/p>\n

She could not see herself!<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

May 9, 2009<\/strong><\/p>\n

*Westerly RI<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(with a nod to Francis Thompson)\u00a0   She ran She fled \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7zCq3-al","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":910,"url":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/2017\/06\/11\/three-fairy-tales\/","url_meta":{"origin":641,"position":0},"title":"Three Fairy Tales","author":"James Crafford","date":"June 11, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0n our town, legend has it, we are sometimes visited by\u00a0\u00a0 goblins and fairies not always friendly and tame. rom an early age, all of us have heard tales of this, \u00a0and we\u00a0would sometimes laugh them off, \u00a0while other times, perhaps evenings when the fire burned long and the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Fiction"","block_context":{"text":"Fiction","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/category\/fiction\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"caprice_medium","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/caprice_medium.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1038,"url":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/2018\/01\/14\/a-light-through-time\/","url_meta":{"origin":641,"position":1},"title":"A Light Through Time","author":"Jeff Ginsburg","date":"January 14, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"For most of my adult life, I would call my parents, but only once a week. Even into my retirement, I had to preserve my sense of independence. But their average age is now over ninety, so our daily phone calls reassure me they are stable and I energize them\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Non-fictions"","block_context":{"text":"Non-fictions","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/category\/contents\/submissions\/non-fictions\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"collage (1)","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/collage-1-683x1024.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":293,"url":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/2016\/07\/13\/do-it-all-again\/","url_meta":{"origin":641,"position":2},"title":"DO IT ALL AGAIN","author":"Linda Myers","date":"July 13, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"I am sheathed in gray, riding under smoky clouds and through heavy fog, soaked through on this late October afternoon, a light mist sliding off my lashes and I stick out my tongue to catch the rivulets running down my face. I am atop, Chip, my seventeen hand gelding, a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Prose"","block_context":{"text":"Prose","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/category\/prose\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"note 4 july1016 340","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/note-4-july1016-340.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/note-4-july1016-340.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/note-4-july1016-340.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/note-4-july1016-340.jpg?resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/note-4-july1016-340.jpg?resize=1050%2C600 3x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/note-4-july1016-340.jpg?resize=1400%2C800 4x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1102,"url":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/2019\/06\/23\/the-caregiver\/","url_meta":{"origin":641,"position":3},"title":"The Caregiver","author":"Jeff Ginsburg","date":"June 23, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"\u201cI\u2019m done resting Ethan, how \u2018bout you?\u201d I whisper. We both feel soft after practicing yoga and our hour-long, turning-within meditation technique. We\u2019re still resting on the large\u00a0mat that covers half the floor of our studio apartment. Two years ago while learning this technique, we met and three months later\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Fiction"","block_context":{"text":"Fiction","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/category\/fiction\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Jeff- Caregiver","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Jeff-Caregiver.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1012,"url":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/2017\/10\/29\/noah-and-the-carpenter\/","url_meta":{"origin":641,"position":4},"title":"Noah and the Carpenter","author":"Kelly L. Goodridge","date":"October 29, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 \u00a0 On Halloween Eve, while Rick littered his front lawn with mock foam tombstones, his former neighbor Chuck stopped to visit. They shook hands.\u00a0 Chuck was close to 50, his once brown hair now peppered with gray.\u00a0 Rick hadn\u2019t seen him in years.\u00a0 \u201cWhat\u2019s up, man?\u201d \u201cWell, I was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Prose"","block_context":{"text":"Prose","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/category\/prose\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"IMG_3190 2","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/IMG_3190-2-1024x625.jpeg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":825,"url":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/2017\/02\/08\/for-lack-of-a-hat-part-ii\/","url_meta":{"origin":641,"position":5},"title":"For Lack of a Hat Part II","author":"L Dewender","date":"February 8, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 \u00a0 Lady takes a cursory look around the room; even without direct eye contact she can see the wrinkled faces and craning necks over the high back chairs, stretching toward her... She smiles apprehensively and backs away. She had no intention of making a spectacle of herself.\u00a0 She doesn\u2019t\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Short Story"","block_context":{"text":"Short Story","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/category\/contents\/submissions\/short-story\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"galaxynotesept2016 128","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/galaxynotesept2016-128-237x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=641"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":652,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641\/revisions\/652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.talesfromthelake.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}