She When

Get home and have some of the Pinot that I brought from tasting room. Yes, a perquisite, but also a struggle. How many times have I tasted this particular bottle. Her character hasn’t developed that much. I don’t think. Maybe I’m numb. Maybe I’m suffering from palate fatigue. I know, poor me. But as a writer this is something with which I’m to grapple. The herbal shape is till there, wild berry– no, see? I’m tired of saying that… organic, dirty, raw raspberry and licorice, mint… but I’m still with plain expression. Cranberry and brown sugar, but how can I be sure. I set my glass down and contour into my thoughts lazily. What am I tasting? Should I just be drinking and writing and not thinking so hard about this? Bottle opened earlier today so maybe I should open something else and leave this for tomorrow nuit. Not sure what to do. I just stare at the glass, wonder what she’s thinking, what she’s thinking about me. She knows I’m a writer, that I analyze, if you could call this analysis… that I look further into wine than most. That I work in the industry– of course she knows that, we work together and she came home with me. She’s not communicative, though. Or maybe I’m not listening closely enough. She’s a rare illustration. More than the industry, more than a portrait, more than something on a tasting menu in a winery room. She… speaking again, with sip next.

Another pour. More spinning her in glass like we’re salsa or flamenco dancing. We are. We’re on the floor. I’m being led, so willingly by this countess. More climate and demand, thesis and throw, knowledge and story for me, for us. I stop myself in this writing for a second to sip the room I’m in, in my home, quiet, and just me, her. Wine, defined far past what’s in glass. The kitchen tiles I stand on, the drive home, me taking time to write her, or my reaction to her. Voltage on each millimeter of the scribbler’s shell. I just stand more, note more expected “descriptors” like ‘cranberry’ and ‘tea leaf’. I become disgusted avec mes mots, and just more freely form in my formation with her. Can a bit feel her bite, so I stall before reaching for that red glass, one of the many my wife owned before ever knowing me. Lift, olfactory… coy milk chocolate and tobacco. Not much else new. Yes, I’m fatigued. Think she’s breaking up with me. And maybe a thin hall of black pepper. I have no idea anymore. I feel rejected, dejected. A bit confused. What else can I do but just stand here and write about this wine in front of me that I’m not sure if I understand too well, not well enough, or not at bloody all. Even the writer’s home seems foreign. So I lean against the counter, looking down at the Pinot, sip, gone, more notes. “Poised…expansive, sensible…geometric…” What the fuck am I talking about? Me, her, now. A tussle. She wants me to follow her. And I will. I do. Blindly.