Mountain Air

Three, what is it, four Aprils ago, my friend,
I drove the half mile from your house to mine
during the spell when we were neighbors
under towering cedars and elms that spilled
their needles on the patchy lawn—
sharp crowns that seemed to always
find their way into clean laundry. You taught me
how to use a Singer that summer, patient
in your hot apartment, hooking a thread
through the bobbin, then moved here
to the foothills in the fall. That night
we sat beneath the ancient oak
in your backyard drinking dark, cherry wine.
It was magnificent—the talk, poetry, the taste
of it lingering over espresso. I floated home,
the headlights of my old Audi lighting a gang
of adolescent coyotes. The shirt we made
was hanging on the line like a moth, hovering
transparent over the loamy yard. A slice of moon
shone bright on the dim and distant house.
I was satisfied. This was peak maturity.
The hint of night-blooming jasmine
in the cold spring air
Remembering it so completely now
leaves my heart empty.