Taking more drugs and not sleeping
as well, just napping between moonlit
panic attacks: ovens left on in dreams
now on fire, and we can’t remember if
we left a realization behind, or another
cancelled deadline–all I can focus on
is distraction, like birds wheeling away
down a fence a block long, just a swirl
of bodies in motion, six feet at a time,
landing purposefully, then disperse: oh
what will I do when the season of long
walks has passed, and the afternoon sun
cannot stroke me with warm confusion,
even if this year the peaches were only
orange skin-wrapped stones, perhaps
having to do with hard water or sandy
soil, or hard times, but we must make
pie, whipping our cream into stiff peaks,
preparing for dessert, for the lies within
a blueberry or blue raspberry. We lured
a glacier into a bottle; that’s science for
you: clenched time in plastic, which is
just energy from mammoths frozen in
crevices and tapped like another keg at
a summer party no one should go to, or
the catchment barrel under the gutters,
even if it only fills with rain once. We’re
beyond the hegemony of the lawn’s reign,
green gone; another opportunity lost to
gain support for pollinators, before polls
close on flowers for the fall, or every sip
of wine sap swells or shrivels beyond U
pick reach. Perhaps cabbages will still
bloom, but who could be bothered with
lawn maintenance, while we watch the
moon ripening rustily from our neglect.