Lynda Hull

In those days I thought their endless thrum
was the great wheel that turned the days, the nights.
In the throats of hibiscus and oleander

I’d see them clustered yellow, blue, their shells
enameled hard as the sky before the rain.
All that summer, my second, from city

to city my young father drove the black coupe
through humid mornings I’d wake to like fever
parceled between luggage and sample goods.

Gone to seed, ailanthus, the poverty
tree. Take a phrase, then
fracture it, the pods’ gaudy nectarine shades
ripening to parrots taking flight, all crest
and tail feathers.
A musical idea.
Macaws
scarlet and violet,
tangerine as a song