Postcards from late summer

The ground in front of the bargain

wedding chapel is littered with

shiny plastic hearts and stars

and small coins. We

squat on the pavement

shoving them into

our pockets.

I bring my guitar home

and we play on the fire escape

you with your tiny, tiny

violin tucked under

your chin.

Me, playing songs from

an empty living room

before you were born

when I used to see

the towers

outside the dirty

glass of my

bachelor windows.

It’s time to buy

a watermelon now

not too big

and it needs to sound

like a drum.

They stopped

building the skyscraper

behind

our place. Maybe it’s

for offices,

maybe for homes.

A crane sits motionless above

the half-built

skeleton, in

a cloudy sky, a wet

night, a windy Sunday. But someone

had the idea to

inflate a great

red balloon inside the

structure

and put lights

inside it

so at night

it beats like a giant

heart, against the dark sky

a giant heart, counting

out the minutes

until the crane

will move, or maybe

until the

snow will come.

The leaves are already turning

yellow.