Primavera

By Christopher Bernard

The afternoon lies across the air

like a page of ice,

dazzling and shadowless.

You walk across it,

through it, beneath it,

looking for a crack in the light,

trying, without success, to hide.

The eyes you meet are gray as ashes.

The words you hear disappear like clouds.

A scarf lies abandoned on a curb.

Somewhere there is the sea,

a party’s laughter, and someone is singing,

and summer holds the night in its arms.

But not here, and not now.

You scratch on the ice a forgotten name for spring.

____

Christopher Bernard has published two volumes of poetry: The Rose Shipwreck and Chien Lunatique. He is co-editor of the webzine Caveat Lector.