When I was just a tween, I met a beautiful woman twice my age. Her name was Harriotte. She was blind, but had the most exquisite green eyes. Long flowing red hair. She was tucked away in an obscure little town. She did not want to touch my face, because of a traumatic past she wouldn’t share. So I spoke with her for a very long time, trying to express to her who I was, while trying to peek into her mysterious world.
No one but her husband had ever heard her voice. After long hours of friendship, she finally agreed to sing for us, a family of music lovers and musicians. She sang more beautifully than Karen Carpenter, if that is possible. I saw something in her husband’s eyes that I didn’t understand at the time. Now I can see it clearly as jealousy. He was also a musician and a singer. Perhaps he was the one who did not want her to sing. She was very dependent upon him in this town that she was unfamiliar with.
As I look back, I think of all the hidden people, living on our streets, and in cars, and campers, and hotels, and wonder what they would offer if they could have the opportunity to shine. Here is the poem I wrote for her, Harriotte.
unicorns wear uniforms
Of a sort;
they don shimmering silver coats, and tails of diamond sprays
No unicorn ever forgets to button on her spiral staircase of
a horn.
long tendrils of fire struck hair, glistening in the yellow
light of your voice.
a unicorn most rare.
Just to leaven the heavy bread of truth:
the poem’s images did not spring fully formed from the head of Zeus. Like most children, I was still processing my latest discovery: The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams — just sayin’.