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the birds were politely silent tho’ one still shat into the fountain
but the breeze blew and Abril was in tune with the hills
and our coven of poets sprawled as if exhausted orgy

                              which was to come
the middle‐aged woman with black hair & embroidered dress
read lines of secrets about her dead husband
he never guessed her name was Patricia Somebody
& her husband was Paul Somebody
& he was dead
but I was not dead then
& I was strategic
 

& the hurt man, the one with the hidden wound he shared only
with discreet inner‐circle members & alluded to in his hymns to rebellious
& the bright girl from Albany who had three glasses of wine & farted
                             & laugh’d and pretend’d to pass out in my arms
 

the wise woman mother‐of‐the‐world‐type whom no one dare’d
had a cash settlement in mind for the situation in Miami & still
had that fabulous accent even after 50 years, but her images were fresh

                            & her eyes guaranteed her mystical
 

the rest more or less I’d forgotten until the dreams
they pressed their faces to the station glass of my mind
waving silently as if to attract the waiter
what cared or even knew I, the distant Mrs. Somebody
 

I came to know whatabody & understood perhaps where Mr had gone
the hurt man & wise woman & bright girl are now dead
& the descendants of the Abril birds are just as polite as their ancestors
still occasionally crapping into the fountain
 

that’s what spring days there are made for, for youth & those
willing to go on the pilgrimage
& for those who understand such pilgrimages
might begin where Chaucer or other poets started