Things To Do on an Afternoon in August

 

 

Go through old letters and smile, remembering.
Send loving messages to friends still alive to
let them know you remember those golden days
in the sun when you, and they, and the world
were young. Play the music that was the sound track
of your life back then; remember wailing away
all afternoon with Connie Francis and Brenda Lee,
dreaming of the love story that was waiting for you
up ahead, how it would turn your life from painful
to happy. Don't spend too much time thinking about
what happened instead. 

Stay indoors out of the heat, and drink iced tea,
cold from the fridge. Watch an eagle fly over,
in the cloudless blue, as the fog slowly rolls in,
knowing it will swallow the beach
where hundreds of tourists are fitting 
a year's worth of fun into three too-short days.

Remember the town as it was thirty years ago.
Write the Village Council asking them to save
what's left of our local forest, threatened by
that onerous word: Development, a monster
with an insatiable appetite who can't be stopped.

Spend the rest of the day
remembering

     remembering

          remembering

the golden years of laughter and dreams
that shine so, now, in reverie.