Friday nights, when the temperature dipped below 100°F, my brothers would head to the Hot House and if I was lucky, they’d let me tag along.
“Don’t touch anything.” My older brother Bobby would warn, spritzing himself with our father’s finest aphrodisiac.
The Hot House was a plastic palace overrun with sweaty men staring at the long stem beauties on display. Colorful blossoms of every variety swung overhead on hundred-year-old vines.
“Care to taste my nectar?” said a black-eyed Suzy.
“But I’m not old enough to sip.”
She lifted her petals. “I’ll make an exception.”
I tried to think of what my mother always said before the heat stroke: “Beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror.
And even though I knew it was a sin, I couldn’t resist. After that night, I became a love criminal looking to commit my next felonious act.
d’Verse Poet’s Pub |Prosery: Rainer Maria Rilke
144 words of prose to include:
“For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror.” from “The First Elegy”, Duinos Elegies by Rainer Maria Rilke
Cover Art: Where summer ripens at all hours, 2019. Angela Fraleigh
Yard Sale of Thoughts 
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