Is it fun,
watching death come in
week by week,
ice crystals melting
by afternoon,
turning the last zinnias
to mush?
Who imagines this as
caramel apple time,
wool stadium blankets
and bonfires?
Well, I think they have
a screw loose.
I think they’re stuck
in another time, or
an advertising world
that never really existed.
Now, spring, that’s another
story — there’s a real season
for you. My daughter
picks wild onions outside
Abraham Lincoln’s house,
eats them in the car
on the drive back to Chicago,
where my son sees the first
painted lady of the year.