Meads

Meads
by Will

Lights out at Meads—
scarved hipsters mill and preen,
and one poses, stalked to bliss
by my stealth amanuensis
hawking arbitrage into these lines
if she'd freeze, just hold that frown.

But she wishes this were the city.
Ours is a place seized up (she says)
a place of spent momentum. And so
as Saturday heels retract into the rust
of carpool pickup trucks she feels
they've only played tonight at giving up—
their gay racket, electric press
humored this time only because
these flagging streets, these slat-ribbed
storefronts know, what wins in the end
and what's left of us.

I beside her, bounded one,
fearing a loss have convinced myself
the world beyond's played its only glamor
out on line, trolled fat and writhing
to hook and haul us in. Talk turns
to whose dreams are eclipsing whose
and I bid her: bite above the leader,
spit out the sinker, lovely
and find enough right here.