Sean Carlson
The Greatest of Ease

“Cry on my shoulder,” I meant
as those summer-enders dappled the final hours of August
and the Martha’s Vineyard-tan from beneath your eyes.
“This can’t happen to you,” I again meant
but didn’t speak while midnight curfew trickled closer
and that still somewhat-lit skyline must have been muddled
from the beautified pollution of Lawrence and eyes draining divorce.
And so you suggested that some days love dies in relationships.
But I knew that it must remain always within friendships.
Which makes me laugh a little louder inside
watching Labor Day arrive faster than even I can drive on these backroads
and believing that this awkward, one-armed embrace
could offer more than the weed-ridden crevices of your heated-brick driveway...
So “god bless you” I meant, as you gently closed the car door goodnight.

<< Back to Issue 4, 2002