John Thompson, Jr.
EMMA'S STORY
Towns as small as this, half-buried
All the summer by the leaves,
Are easy conquests when night drives
Straight west across the limestone hills
Until we are night's center.
Harried
By June bugs and the peering leaves
One light burns in the kitchen like
A held breath; that old skull's
Day takes a long time drying. Hands:
A finger brown as a turkey drumstick
Prods the
Dispatch.
The light bulb warms
The milky oil-cloth, the newsprint swarms,
The window screen drums. Time for bed.
Another June bug hats its head.
Moonlight, streetlight, lost in the breathing
Leaves of the maples. "Don't do that."
"I thought you'd like it, that's all." Shifting
Those shadows that make darkness darker,
Caged as one awkward wicker chair
Allows, the boy and the girl. Not light
But broken crossings of light in the air
Shine on the spindly porch posts so
The eyes are bathed and drowned there. "No."
"The whole town's all asleep but us."
"My father." "Well." Someplace near,
Hidden, bright or dark, a goddess.
What
is
night? "The night lies down
Upon me. Father, do you hear?"
Buzz of insects in his ear,
Hand on the last light left in town.
