Hooftaps

The gods of summer grow fat in their swelter of heaven, 
Squatty, drunk on the sweat dripping from bare breasts.

And I grow leaner, or as lean as the heavy years will let me, 
Staking the dahlias, trimming the yews, edging the moss

From the terrace stones, my back barbecued under the wet sun. 
I’m on my own, among the dirt daubers and the butterflies,

While others idle in the mountains or along the golden coasts, 
Cool by the snowmelt streams, by blue waves scrolled in diamonds,

Booked into high hotels where the pools are filled with money.
I ease my way through evening with beer and a blister pack of pills,

Taking store of my reserves: a low-watt soul, memories stacked 
Like dusty tins of tomato soup, libido beeping as it backs up.

There’s no telling what you’ll find inside the folded lobes, though 
I’m heartened by any half-truths in a world of lies. Sometimes,

I sit at the old piano I never learned to play, picking out
An angular air, a tune my fingers can just articulate. It seems

To fall through great space, tilted on its axis like this planet 
That won’t go roistering around the stars and won’t stay still.

And sometimes, when the midnight moon slides its light across 
The bedroom window, I can almost see the invisible children,

The children that we were, riding time away on the rocking horse, 
Faster and wilder, in our hands the little reckless whips.

Read more from Issue 15.1.