Last of This; First of That
       

No no no no: mild admonition, a child
at the water's edge, but all is well, basically.
Undulations more than waves. Blue blue sky.
Passersby ask if I'm studying for college.
I am, I say, as anyone would, too much to explain,
reading Billy Collins so as to be reassured, somewhat.
At its best, that easy style breaks my heart,
but what are the options? Everyone
come watch this, says the boy on the dune.
And again, more urgently, about to jump.
You're a frog now: what only a sister could know.
All this goes down, as they say,
last day of summer; one-thing-after-another year.
A dragonfly putters by. This light belongs in a novel.
I know how it would go, but I can't write it.
Or choose not to, which is the same, in the end.
It's tomorrow here, but it's today where you are,
says the man, confident-like, to his phone,
ignoring the little curl of water so cute at his feet.
He's working on the Vision Statement, as promised.
I'm so glad I mostly have not given up, so there's that.
The paradox of writing is you have to know something;
you have to feel it isn't ever quite right.
A ladybug sits down beside me. Oh, hi. Nice wings!
Not so many beach days left for any of us, maybe.

Tweet
Copyright © 2022 Mary Ann Samyn All rights reserved
from The Louisville Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission