I wait in the rain for a taxi.
This street is newly paved.
The scent of smoke and oil
hover, curl in the air.
Flecks of light reflect in the water
reminding me of diamonds.
 
There wasn’t any pavement
where we lived on the coast,
only snow, gravel and mud.
The winter months were
best when we simmered in
out nest, wintering wasps.
 
The white clapboards preserved
us like a museum vault.
We celebrated spring
by splashing them with schoolhouse
red, a sign, you said, of something
we cherished. But paint cracks and
 
fades quickly in sandy, salty air.
You left in October before the
first snow. There was a long note,
more than I planned to do.
 
It is still raining, the taxi driver
is saying something. I am remembering
the night sky over the coast,
the way stars would shine out over the ocean,
a million hard diamonds.
 
 
 
Open link night at the Pub