~FRANNIE LINDSAY~

PRAYER ON JANET’S BIRTHDAY

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Let the gloves the world needed to touch you
fall away as the last parched leaves
from the birch by the old lake shore
so the waves in the cove
where we waded at night
might exhale once more
over the smooth, unimportant pebbles
and the cattails’ unbending stalks,
and the skittish minnows might gleam anew
beneath the moon’s godly indifference;
let our dear gray boat hold us deep in its palms
so our damp hair might tangle again
in listless pleasure, so our fig-brown lips
might grow sweet with womanly dark,
and my hand find rest at last
on the wing of the nightgown
I begged you to wear all those years,
o child who lived so long.

 

© by Frannie Lindsay