seantime

Sometimes it makes my day
To see you casually stretching there
You do not move, and I stare
Crunches with your headphones on,
Listening to some bassy song

And you, Balanchine-beautiful, you glisten
A bottle of water, a towel of sweat,
Life’s unfair, a beautiful body requires such upkeep
Hours a day you spend here
Oh gym girl
While I climb these steep stairs and go nowhere
And you run in place and go nowhere
Everything else just disappears
Alabaster skin and long brown hair
Lithe legs treading in air
It’s a body to die for,
An object of obsession
For you, for me, for everybody here
They may not say it, but they know
That no one else compares

Sometimes you run forward, sometimes you run back
It’s hard to keep track, the speed blurs thinking
It mesmerizes because it is an extension of you, of you

I will never be as strong, as fair
As I was and as you are
And in a few more years, you’ll lose it, too
All the exercise you do
Will go white to blue
Ironic age
Beauty is truth and lies prevail
Memories linger but the body fails

And when my workout’s done
You still run