a summer evening before I met you

the loon in black silouhette
let us dance ripple on the glassy water
after the sun sets and the bats chase mosquitos
to and fro along the shore

for love is fleeting,
our time almost through
the blades of grass have been sung
the needles of every pine dreamt
and fallen orange to the clay below

my hopes are etched in trite words
lost in a dirge of electric chaos
-- a memory of despair and the musty smell
of teens in a bunk room talking about
sex and electric guitar

but my dreams,
they are not so dead yet
the loon, she wil remember
and call them when I am not even a memory

my heart is revealed there
to my daughter's daughter
to my son's son

my prayers are fulfilled on that distant shore
shaded by beech and fir, draped in blueberry bushes
and the gentle song of a lone cardinal
more holy than the pope.

lest we forget
that loon and her song
let me kiss you now before the milkyway
washes us down to the blackest of holes
let me hold you here
while the bats regale us with dance
whisper our names so that we can not hear

God will hear.

Salvation -- that's all this is
here where all loves die
in new hampshire.