Ron Best loaned me his girlfriend
for the Junior prom. She graduated
two years before from another school,
had a job and great tight sweaters.
She held her Lucky Strike like a pencil,
blew smoke out her nose, didn’t drink beer
but carried bourbon in her purse. I would
have been in love if it hadn’t been for Ron.
On the slow dances, she’d snuggle in my neck,
her hands on my butt. “Are they all watching?”
she’d ask.
It had been a bad year. Dumped by two girls,
each one, I knew, was the one. Stretched
out ahead would have been the house
squared with the lawn, white stake fence,
steady job, two weeks off in the summer.
I didn’t know it then, but I was on the edge
of Brewer, Maine. The last dive off the cliff
to New York City, then the swim through the surf
toward the rest of my life.
Ron’s girl pushed her Marilyn brassiere
against my sport coat lapels, her face
in my neck. Later, as I delivered her
to Ron’s waiting car, she whispered,
“If he ever dumps me, you’re next.”
And I’ve been looking over my shoulder
ever since, after every divorce.
Would the cigarettes have got her,
the bourbon? Or, would we be
in some town an hour from the opera,
her teaching English, still tight under
the sweater, and me trimming the hedge,
the grass a perfect green dream,
our afternoon tea in its cozy, steaming.
is a writer who has integrated his poetry with his business life for decades. Now,
three wives deep, four children long, and assorted careers past, he continues to
study, publish, and write in San Diego. Publications and awards include:
Eclipse; The Cape Reader; A Year In Ink, Volume 6; The San Diego Reader;
Alaska Quarterly Review; etc; and a nomination for a Pushcart Prize as well
as an Honorable Mention in San Diego CityBeat’s Fiction 101 Contest.