FOR THE LAST SUMMER

That summer with a thousand Julys

nothing mattered but the sweat on a girl's chest,

the sun's crazy blue weather, and a young man's

hands electric with want.  The wind

above convertibles sighed in the cottonwood leaves,

the stars were stars, and the moon shimmered

in its own silver heaven.  He was king

of the swath a train whistle cut.

Crazy for speed, he held the girl and wheel

and plummeted toward the bottomlands,

foundry lights ablaze in the distance,

and war let him the songs he swore

he'd never forget.  That summer

of week-long nights, blossom-dark,

fragrant with dew and a dust

as fine as milled flour, he dreamed.

And his dreams were all glory and light,

line drives than never fell, his friends

he friends forever, and war

let him sleep until noon and wake

with the scent of his girl around him,

remembering the night before-

how he sang of a loss he couldn't imagine,

of broken hearts he cold almost believe.

That summer with a thousand Julys

the sun going down each afternoon was more

beautiful than the day before, the factory smoke

vermilion and rust in its slant, and the night-

hawks like needles stitching the darkness down.

Nothing smelled as sweet as the gasoline

he pumped, nothing arced so cleanly

as the shop towels he tossed toward their baskets.

The world rode shotgun and reclined

on the seat of his car, lovely in the glow

from the dash lights, soft and warm,

and he knew what it meant to adore.  War

let him dawdle there, virtuoso of the radio,

king of the push buttons, and all that played

for him, in the only hours of his life he ever knew

as his own, was music, music, music.