One thinks for a moment
At the beginning
That life will be orchestras playing at weddings
Cake and bridesmaids’ bouquets
Nights a little tipsy
Or filled with hallucinations of a garden of stuffed animals
The roar of an expressway like a waterfall in the distance.
Driving in cars to airports
To pick up luggage filled with grass.
Boys who want to run their hands up your leg.
Sweet kisses, deep and filled with longing
And lust.
One thinks this will last forever.
Enjoy being young, we are told.
We can see the physical changes.
The bodies grown wrinkled,
A bit stooped,
Slower, a bit musty.
But it’s not the body changes that dim the orchestra
And the street lamps wetly off the pavement.
One stares with far-off eyes into an unknown distance
Wondering where the others went who came before
And wandering off darkling into the everylasting night.
We’ve heard the orchestra before
Danced our dances.
No more young men who want to run their hands up my legs.
No more sweet kisses that last until dawn.
Only night.
Only the fading strains of the orchestra that is getting
ready to pack its gear.
