How Aphrodite caused a riot on the Bart Train and made me late for work Please forgive me, dearest Boss I know the meeting was at 9 o'clock and a million dollar contract on the line but... You see, the train was full of work-dead faces this morning - scentless, silent men and women head to toe black-clad and cool Then she sauntered on at 12th Street wearing a dress of deep rose silk her foam white breasts barely restrained And oh, that magnificent deep curve where waist met hip, where fabric blossomed like lotus petals and a man could drown Her voice was seawind and sunlight, the soft violet deep, churning, turning "Will this carriage take me to the Ocean?" Half the train was dumbstruck, the other half embarrassed speechless she just smiled and sashayed down the aisle She was a witch well past her prime, the women, sizing up the plump silhouette and rapunzel hair dismissed her with flick of skeletal fingers But the men were stunned and mesmerized they knew she was the bird of paradise they'd waited for their whole, passionless lives The men began to follow her in wild frenzy tumbling helter-skelter in her wake like a herd of kittens after clotted cream And the whole damned train filled with the moans of crazed besotted men and out-raged women Until the driver slammed on the brakes He let 'Miss Dressed in Pink'  off a thousand feet beneath the bay and and put an end to it and that's how Aphrodite caused a riot on the bart train and made me late for work... (c) 2007 J.L. Stanley