Violet stood beneath a dainty parasol stitched
in silken embroidery a garden of Paradise.
Her eyes were dark and deep, waiting. They
were full and large, expecting.
Impatient
Elaine paced precisely as in courtly dance
positioning each narrow foot accented by buckled gleaming
black.
They
could hear Cleo's laugh long before
she arrived.
Elaine
paced proudly her spine eloquent in its sinuousity.
Exquisitely delicate features etched intaglio
upon the bosom of the dripping trees and
with vines setting her pale shoulders Elaine
formed a stunning visual feast promising ineluctably
and she knew it and enjoyed
it while pacing irritably her
white wig crowning her intent smooth it was,
white, smooth, costly, coiffed tremendously
and appropriately for day and time and intent
and, too, for the sepia mole resting on her
cheek.
Jewels
flashed from her and did no more than justice to
the unmarred white column of her throat.
Unlike
the previous century's lust and contentment with ripe pearls these
jewels, Elaine's, were fire and tales, illustrious
endeavor, the risk and wealth, all of that
coveted, the risk and wealth and wild heedless
endeavor, the coup, of
the East, from the East.
The
world had expanded.