brings in a night
of listless mosquitoes,
lobbed noises, cooling air;
street ball gives way to darkness,
final innings, returning fans.
In the park the sycamores
are hung with locust husks.
Sandwiches have grown funny in their wrappers,
the Nehi a last fizzy swallow of foam.
Ants run across the lazy boy’s bare arms;
his girl has grown brown.
The engineer across the street,
home early, uncoils hose
across his burned-out grass,
examines shrubbery,
considers cutting back the hedge,
curses a kick ball in the peas.
He vows never again pole beans,
maybe never again a garden.
In his hot room
the teenager gets ready for a dance
in the popular girl’s backyard.
His tight jeans not tight enough,
long hair not long enough,
before the mirror he tries on shirts,
tries not to sweat,
steals album cover stances,
and contemplates himself.
hide and seek is not for her.
Three baths, then quiet for awhile,
a little drink, TV, bed.
Her husband wishes his oak would die,
taking its acorns with it,
leaving garden space.
A radio cheers briefly.
Infrequent couples walk down the ill-lit street.
Someone shoves a wagon off the sidewalk;
it rattles loudly, stops in grass.
Moonlight paws the bushes, climbs the trees.
Factories let out
onto silence.
Cigarettes glow,
then grow apart.
The second shift goes home.
Up the street a car door slams,
bass rumble, soprano giggle.
Upstairs, my wife and daughters sleep
damp beneath cotton sheets,
legs snaking, seeking coolness.
Five minutes in the dark downstairs
behind the latched screen door I stand,
watching, wanting, satisfied.