David Mungoshi's new sequence

Just a hitch-hiker’s fantasy

(by David Mungoshi)

With fluid ease
she  leaned against the window of the open truck
And let the baby play with her nipples
richly-exposed!
The vehicle tore into the miles and left behind a long yawning road
And with the soft pink towel
from inside the baby bag
She wiped the milk oozing down  her dress
and let the wind do the rest
The supple and heavenly figure of a sweet temptress
in a peasant woman's cotton dress
that transcended the limitations
Exploded into the poet's consciousness through a view
of shapely legs
that could have easily won plaudits and a review
in some avant garde collector's item man's magazine
All this and more,
the poet thought and felt from the back of the truck
The older woman, the mother of the husband, so the poet learned
Had a twinkle in her eye
and a smile that said it was all right to flirt
And for just a short while be the village belle that strangers could adore
and poets could wax lyrical about in a poem about valued female assets
She too
was having her fun
in a kind of delayed season mode -vicariously on that grand stage
at the back of a swift truck
where dreams died all too soon as one's station loomed nearer
The poet
took it all in, in a glance
that lingered upon the woman's lips
The quiver there was rich
with the abundant promise of a free spirit
Daring him with her eyes to take her there and then
on wings of fancy
To ravish her upon a soft earthen altar 'neath the tropical sky
In that fleeting moment
the world stood still though the truck sped by
And their wayward souls willed a merger of their hungry longings
Then she laughed
a coarse laugh
spiced with raw desire
and just like that the moment was gone; and they both knew it,
but she of the face without make-up, she, a woman and a free spirit,
had won against a gaping poet with a note book and lots of words in his heart
Propelled
and puzzled
by the intensity of the moment
and the lessons
he still had to learn,
the poet
told himself he would do so soon
on a lazy October afternoon in the heat of the hot dry season
If she still would play,
and if the husband's mother would hum a tune,  
keep the baby quiet
and lull her to sleep with a drowsy lullaby
It was
all just a fantasy, the poet conceded with some reluctance,
something you dream up when you hitch-hike

 *** This is a very recent poem. The poet is currently working on a sequence to be called: 'Love and Hurt' - The Poems of David Mungoshi.