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From some neighbor’s place, “Moon River.”
It trickles down the stairs & under our door.
It puts chopsticks in my chignon & spritzes you with Youth Dew.
In the Mansion of Many Apartments,
the 60s is a locked rec room we can’t get into.
They’ve changed the code. I guess
we just have to stand naked in the hallway
under the energy efficient light bulbs.
Modernity is the worst fate: it bumps you with its fist.
It kitches the apple blossoms & commodifies the owls.
There is so very little time left to love in the Grand Old Style.
If you’re coming to collect me, please do it quickly.
I’ve made you a highball. I’ve sung you a song.
Look. The Century’s Parade shimmies away from us:
flash of brass, pomp of parasol, heat haze.
“Moon River” tapers & we start to bicker.
What has our anonymous neighbor done to us this time?
And with us out of ice & so prone to golden age drinking?
I don’t know what a huckleberry friend is, but I suspect
it is something we hold too tight in the dark
when we know we should be rowing.