Come, Tell Me How You Live

So, having no reply to give
    To what the old man said,
I cried "Come, tell me how you live!"
    And thumped him on the head.

Is it a faint smell of burnt toast, or a tang of citrus
that would rise from warm sheets in the morning?

Premonitory sadness draws me from
speculation: either would break a heart
that no repairman would touch. “You just
need a new one, man.”

No. On to the brisk day. The silver casque
settles onto my white head, and my U-lock
is couched in its rest. Laptop in my pack,
reading glasses in its pocket -- all wrapped

in proof: the yellow water-shedding stuff
given me by my daughter's partner long ago
to shield my basket's contents from the rain.

I'm ready to ride on my slightly ridiculous errantry.
Only that song, so familiar that at first
I don't realize I haven't heard it since the Fall --
the stirring of small warmths in the thicket --

the call of à l'arme! à l'arme! -- the danger
that I might take myself seriously, at last,
after all this time.


In response to this Morning Porch post.