A teacher at the chalkboard turns and imagines pushing desks together, lowering her body onto the one whose question about character and conflict still lingers in his mouth. Behind a curtain of textbook and chalk, she shudders thick and shaded inside Jekyll's bones, spine twisting in the hands of what she thought she'd turned to ash by the heat of her good intentions. She unbuttons the hugeness of his coat, hears her voice gone dwarfish and husky, feels Jekyll's nausea in her mouth, Hyde's lust grinding in her molars while stage crews haul away bridges, drag in back alleys and the curtain begins to rise. It's moments like this, the director gone for coffee, stage crew caught with their arms full, when we know what rises in us unbidden is woven to us, more intimate than a lover.
From The Singer's Temple by Barbara Hurd, published by Bright Hill Press. Copyright © 2003 by Barbara Hurd. Reprinted by permission of Bright Hill Press. All rights reserved.