Free verse № 12923
Do Swans Get Jealous? (#2)
As I sit eating my bagel by the tourists in the park
A sunning swan slips past all arch
From neck to breast to wing to tail
Pert in her bodice of sleek and white.
The hot eyes follow
Till a rubbish-truck arrives
When a boy, not seven, in a shirt of livid green
Pats through the flowers to interrogate the dustman
And the eyes follow
The dustman
Red-faced in the heat, jawing with the grinning boy
Pointing at the panting garbage heap.
As I sit, the tourists laughing in their swelter,
The sorbet white of the swan's intent
Ebbs away with the shrug of one
Who has too late noticed the sun's dark sweat.
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