Poems From Providence - The Poet's Press

5
TRYSTING PLACE
In August heat
the fraternity boy
slips out of his shorts,
slides to the warmth
of his eager girlfriend.
They lay on a pioneer grave,
beach towel on a flat shale-stone,
the lap of lake water
matching their rhythms.
Between the rising and falling
as he stops
to tease her wanting,
he reads the stones,
lit up as headlines
by the leering moon,
whispers inscriptions like names
of other women, better lovers:
Jeanette...Sarah...Abigail.
The carpet of grass
seems to undulate.
The lake pulls back its waves,
the sky careens
above the maples.
He feels a host of faces
crowd inside him,
their compound anima
a cauldron of passions.
A diaphanous spinster
clicks tongue
against skull-teeth.