"The Llama Song"

The Llama Song

by Donald G. Redman

I was up late Saturday night. I couldn’t sleep for thoughts of you were invading my dreams like a horde of Tatars.

Easing from the bedside so as not to arouse the woman lying next to me buried beneath layers of blankets, I gathered my robe and tiptoed out into the darkness of my house.

Safe in the kitchen, I grabbed a small snifter and a bottle of cognac and went into the den to seek you out. And there I found you, tucked inside my favorite poetry book – the same tattered book I brought with me when we stole that weekend to your family’s beach house.

I tried recalling some of the poems we liked, but they all seemed to blend together. I do remember you were fond of Walt Whitman.

It was getting really late and I thought of returning to the woman beneath the blankets. Her slumber was intense; sounds of her snoring echoed down the dark hallway and reverberated off my blackened heart.

The cognac cried out for one more sip and so I obliged.

I scanned past a few more odes, telling myself each would be the last, and then I came across “The Llama Song.” Suddenly, you were stretched out across the couch next to me, your head resting on my lap. I saw your eyebrows, how they arch in such a taunting fashion. I saw your slightly crooked smile and I felt a warmth no cognac could ever provide.

You remember “The Llama Song” don’t you? It wasn’t really called that, but we gave it that name. It was a poem about a couple who realized they were falling in love with each other while still in other relationships. There was a verse something like, “I will not let you love me, but my love for you is so intense.”

They tried valiantly to fight their feelings and you told me you could relate; that you were being torn between two emotions, one to start life anew with me and the other to stay put. I agreed, saying I felt like Dr. Doolittle’s two headed llama and you laughed. “Pushmi-pullyu! This will be our Llama Song.”

The poem ended with the couple caving to love and running off together to spend eternity sipping nectar at the feet of the gods. Or something like that.

But you aren’t one to completely cave are you? You said “The Llama Song” was ultimately a fairytale; there are no happy endings in the affairs of the heart. People are tempted by affairs to feel alive again, but eventually you fall from heaven and are no longer sipping nectar at the feet of the gods, but mopping the kitchen and mowing the grass.

You said I’d get bored and eventually find someone new to sing “The Llama Song.”  No, you wouldn’t be running away with me, you said.

I was as crushed as any mortal could ever be. “Look at me!” I pleaded. “My head is bursting through the sky of love. My hair is dripping with nectar. Love me!”

“But how can I tell if you will ever love me again as you do now?”

Of course I said I would love you forever and again, but that question still haunts me to this day. It’s the question I was mulling when I arose from bed to seek you out.

I corked the cognac and returned it to the shelf. Through the bay window I could see that a new day was wrestling for the reigns from the night, but the fix was in and it was just a matter of time before the nighttime surrendered.

The corner streetlight cast a grey umbrella of light over my lawn. I could see the grass was high and weeds had sprung up as if in a race to tower the trees. For a brief moment thoughts of you vanished, only to be replaced with those of lawnmowers.

Suddenly, the snoring of the woman buried beneath layers of blankets stopped. I cursed the silence.

And then it started back up like a trusty lawnmower cranks up after having choked momentarily on a clump of grass.

It was in that blissful moment between night and day that I understood “The Llama Song.” Just as am asking you, I had once asked the woman buried beneath the blankets to love me. My head had burst through the sky of love. My hair had dripped with nectar. But how could I tell if I would ever love her again as I did then?

I wanted to cry. I was weak with sadness and it felt as if my legs would surrender, but I was braced by the snores coming from the woman buried beneath the blankets.

I stumbled back to bed. I needed the rest for soon I’d be mowing the lawn.

Copyright 2012 Donald G. Redman All Rights Reserved Illustration by Donald G. Redman.