On the Summer Fields

I’ve been walking for a mile The woman stalking me has been sniffing for a while She has become my second shadow I hope I am not the source of her sorrow. I quicken my steps on the quagmire of illusion She hastens with her shadow on the plinths of delusion One thing is sure: I’d out-walk her. She makes her resolution as well not to remain in the rear. Summer’s boiling breath is upon us, her and me I thirst for solidarity with the sun and the sea I wondered what she hungered for —bread or wine The hays are all scorched on this tillage not far from the Rhine I know her not from anywhere Does she know me from any square — Trafalgar or Madison or Time? London and New York, in summer, raise hell and chime I study the space between us Not too wide as from navel to guts The fields and their ogling lights begin to dim I walk faster, I breathe harder, I skim She follows up with the same verve Through serpentine paths, I lost my nerve But at the last corner of the woods, Summer filtered out, summoning protocols of the hoods I never saw her again, nor her shadow, so restless Someone told me that was her last summer, so contentless For me, that was indeed my first; The first in which I skimmed over a hirst. These, I understand, are end times Both for festivals and serotinal matters in terms of dimes But I mustn’t hasten through them, Even though they cause me to run the phlegm.