for Frank
I do not belong to the sobbing school of Negrohood who hold that nature has given
them a lowdown dirty deal and whose feelings are all hurt about it....
No, I do not weep at the world - I am too busy sharpening my oyster knife.
--Zora Neale Hurston
Under a steaming Sunday noonday sun the sullen bees swarm
over abandoned cars and the empty hulls of sailboats.
We remember pausing to catch our breath on the high climb
up the steep hill to our humble white house above the lake.
An empty trailer, windows broken out, lies helpless and tilted on one side.
Nothing belonging to us works. The car motor stalled, went completely dead.
We sold our old car parts, and you bought me flowers and chocolate.
And as the sun's afternoon heat melted the candies inside my hand,
the irreverent metal turned to rust in a rain shower.
On our way home from Mass, we witnessed a minor miracle:
a cross of smoke rising into the azure sky. Prediction: extinction. Apocalypse.
But tomorrow arrived with a cadence of new sun & long hours of leisure.
Someone is keeping a selfish secret.
The other one has been betrayed.