PEACH

The belief that I

will never know you

any more

must be wrong

Today I bought a peach

your favorite food

in season too late

Has it traveled

too far    freezing on the way

That is almost always the case

with grocery store peaches

you say in my head

where those

gray cortical folds

hold you for dear life

THE CORRECT SEASON

Marilyn Monroe felt

not like spring

not like summer

flaunting cherries

but like hot dry autumn

a furnace with its parts

and fuels spread

over nondescript hills

that say Lie down here

just for a minute

ABSENT FROM THE FEAST AND HAVING HER OWN

Saw a copperhead curled
on the doormat a week
or so ago

said the landlord the man
who lived in a farmhouse
nearby

She laughed and said
she would wear
stout boots

The trailer one of the smallest
ever made

dated from the 1940s

chrome bathed in vines
including orange morning glory

and sucker vines that pricked
when you pulled them off

Art Moderne she said
to herself

the vines like art history
with all the contests raging
between artists

sad and happy love affairs
visits to seashores in
bathing costumes

that made their wearers seem fragile
loose in their skins
fit friends for spume

France translated
to Simpson County

suited her    she had the right
this was her trailer
her habitat    she would wind the past
around her little finger

Hers to do with
to think with

Not armor but invitation