Summer 1956, Day One

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Summer

Day one 

1956

Setting: a Garden apartment building in Queens

surrounded by a pasture of concrete.


Goldfish do their pond laps


like old men at the Y.


A block away


trains load and deposit


silent movie men with hats


while Fritz, the German shepherd on the corner


yelps his marching orders like a commandant


I’m four


wearing beach flappy shorts


bare-chested and blonde

cautiously balancing on an invisible high-wire


a tiny Wallenda in socks


as the Platters sing “Only You”


on the Dumont  television set


The parakeets


Pepi and Gigi


flutter and twirl


like they’re on American Bandstand


Sunlight


sneaks in like a cheating husband


striking the framed painted portraits of my sister and I

like a Hollywood Klieg light


My mom marches in


for the ceremonial changing of the 


living room upholstery guard


smelling like instant Maxwell


a top note of aldehydes and bergamot


and a just vanquished Viceroy


with a lipstick tattoo


which has taken a Johnny Weissmuller swan dive into


the pool of a Bone China cup


With a magician’s flourish


she whips off the winter-grim slipcovers


bellows Voila! 


and steps aside to reveal


Hawaii


with hula-dancers 


ukulele strumming natives


and more pineapples than 


the produce department at Key Food


And just like that, 


for the next three months


we will live in the Tropics.


Days will promenade by

at the dozy pace of a parasol twirl


traffic will tumble like tides 


ice cream bells will chime


asphalt will simmer


bikes will transport us 


like a Tom Corbett rocket 


baseball announcers will become our favorite professors


and forever 


for now


will  feel like a very real thing

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