Soft Ice Cream

In the small­est town the still­nesses fill
with crick­ets, the high­way bright
with the dairy light menu gleam­ing
above the dark­ened counter in case
at this impos­si­ble hour
you might like to taste the trickle of rasp­berry
poured per­fectly, curv­ing down from
a rich creamy nip­ple, down into
a red and white paper boat,
pink plas­tic spoon stand­ing upright.
And yel­low let­ter­ing under­neath —
choclat marsh­malo btrscotch hot fudg straw­bery
kid­die sm med lrg delux.

The ground at your feet is lit­tered
with bro­ken glass and bot­tle caps,
laugh­ter flicked from a chained-down pic­nic table
to a crum­bling park­ing block,
the tall tales of cig­a­rette butts’
mouths since gone. And every breath
is an exchange you make know­ingly
with the thick night air
that squats over you, nearly solid
with its whirring of insects and stars.
The spit in your mouth sours
beneath the candy cherry
of your own tongue. 

If any­one were to ask the rea­son for this
you could only reply,
    Who is the sad­ness for?
Sadness has no rea­sons. Sadness is a lux­ury
of spare time, a piece of pie left­over,
the blueberry’s skin caught between your teeth,
the black blear of hap­pi­ness.
No one knows you here, still
you wish you could throw your head back
and burst into an instant jin­gle,
black out the light behind the glass with a stone,
pry up the foil ridge of the sky
and suck all the sweet­ness out.