RALPH MONDAY
Reflection 83

Midsummer's Eve
past
the non-lasting
turtle's reign
giving way
to the inevitable
Scorpion's birth.

All summer
we lay
(thighs pressed together)
basking in the sun,
sipping mint juleps,
sharing mouth liquids,
drinking life before
it dies.

She said:
"Father's having us
out for steaks
and skiing
this evening.
After that
the movies--
how divine!"

Football starts soon,
a moment's idle
diversion
in a life of
diverged moments.
Let's use
the silver flask
this year.

How came
the World
reduced to this
brief, blind
spinning moment?
It has nothing
to do with
Krishna or Nagasaki.

In the FAll
the leaves turned.
We broke out
the wools and
turned to reading (lightly)
Hemingway and Wolfe,
and Jack Daniels
and water, forgetting
the mint juleps.

She said:
"at Christmas Father's
taking us to the Bahamas.
How grand!"
What was it
my Grandmother said
about starving kids
in China?

I don't remember.
Just give me
the moment
before
Winter,
drinks and kisses,
"a good little car,
a warm deep thigh."