Uncles and Aunts of a Certain Ilk

the apple was almost
avuncular
in its roly-poly
quite specific
roundness,
you, on the other
good hand,
reminded us
of family gatherings
at the spinster
aunt’s in Seattle,
perfumed, slender
and bookish.

the event’s effect
was to be social
without pretense,
and related in fact,
yet disconnected.

they’d gather before dinner
in the drawing room,
snifters of brandy
held aloft and so gingerly,
while cartographies
of worlds once believed in
defined talk of faculty appointments
and politics
as they wondered where
they’d perhaps wrongly chosen.

you’d listen as long as possible
to the drone of this polite-ish drivel,
until backyards and fences
couldn’t hold you---
now romping in the tousled outdoors
beckoned and begged
for your strong boyish vigor,
even rain
couldn’t restrain then
your gleaming.

No, not rain could restrain
then your gleaming.