copyright 1997 Jim Chevallier

JASMINE

	Jasmine's what I smell when I feel sad.  It doesn't matter where - 
at the mall, in the locker room, on the way home.  What's around me might be
gas fumes, sweat, cigarettes.  Suddenly through it all I'll smell this sweet
delicate scent, the slight, sure hint of a white flower.  A flower I've 
hardly ever seen.  Or smelled. And never at those moments. Never when I'm 
down.  But right along with the sting of whatever caused the pain - a 
teacher snapping at me, a friend not saying 'hi', my boyfriend looking at 
someone else - wherever it comes from, being put down, being ignored, or 
just being, sometimes, just thinking everything's awful, and I want to be 
left alone - it can cut at me, it can suffocate me, it can make me feel like
there's no light at all - and yet, while it's rushing through me, this hurt,
this failure, his hopelessness that just takes me over at times - I'll smell
it, smell the jasmine, secret and shy, and in the middle of these moments 
when I feel like nothing at all, when I feel like I'm slipping and about to 
go under, there's a sweetness, a kindness, a soft white flower that whispers
my name, that whispers to me and won't let me go.