Random Thoughts on the Fourth of July

Balmy beaches stuck in a mid-70’s pose It’s just streetcars and bobcats and luminous winds Cinematically purple prose and autumn light chroma-key sky The power of white knickers and secret lunchboxes The Raisin Girls rendezvous and yearning predicament Kisses and cooties and swearing wholeheartedly Crossing fingers under the hemlines And taming the beast with calming words and homilies Monday El Niño and Moonbeam Child heroin chic Pink nail polish and boys by the swings Eager their eyes penetrate and devour As the rub against the see-saw breathing in staccato He’s the Irish and her ginger is bought Easy sentiment is ricocheting The slip of the tongue and it’ll bite off your hand And ball and chain your feet And they call her Jolene with the auburn hair With the dusk in her eyes and the snake on her shoulder She wanders easy on their gossip winds Flicker on their disapproval to leave abruptly Practicing to blow up smoke rings Skimming stones and catching gleams in broken bottles Somebody turned down the lights it’s the Fourth of July There’s a woman’s voice down the hall And I pray for the Midas touch And fear that my face have changed so rapidly I’ve had sagacity or so I was beguiled One man’s madrigal is another man’s deceit How I’ve graduated beyond my expectations How I’ve grown so fierce and strong So I disregard the stale air of elitism And promise never to dwell on where I went wrong