Warm September
We sat in a September of record highs,
Too warm for sweaters, even long pants,
Tho' we wore them anyway--
Modesty and humanity are equal
Opportunity, and modesty wins out-
The new neighbors, trying to fit
A Bay window to a poorly-equipped
Shoe-box house, and we remembered
The Old Lady who used to live there, how she
Used to give out dollars for raking leaves--
But now to young men who rake their own
Leaves, struggling with an unwieldy glass
Pane, sweating--
Tho' it is September.
My mother's barrel-chested sometimes-amorous
Consort walks across the sweating street to offer
A hand, like something out of
Steinbeck
Or Springstein,
Tho' I am really not of this blue-collar scene...
Sometimes you go Above it, and I never remember
September being hot...warm, on the fringes,
Wet or clear, or diamond-precise,
But this heat is new.
The little dog roots about, watching blue-collar,
Barrel-chested men putting up a too-large Window
Across the street,
Almost fused--
Almost, there is a bit of difference in the warmth,
Something...
A few more moments in the Royal-midnight closeness, just
Until they put the window up, then go back inside, squirming
Puppy held firmly, and now, the men finishing
Their glass-setting, passing around foamy-amber beer
Laughing, sitting pretty:
A picture for Steinbeck to compose of.
CNN bounces across the store-stickered glass, and really,
It all comes down to That,
Whether September heat or men...simply,
This New World we live in,
Recycled,
Stickered--even so, Steinbeck may have approved. Despite the heat, they still put up that Window