Inventing My Parents

After Edward Hopper’s Nighthawks, 1942

They sit in the bright cafe

discussing Hemingway, and how

this war will change them.

Sinclair Lewis’ name comes up,

and Kay Boyle’s, and then Fitzgerald’s.

They disagree about the American Dream.

My mother, her bare arms

silver under fluorescent lights,

says she imagines it a hawk

flying over, its shadow sweeping

every town.  Their coffee’s getting cold

but they hardly notice.  My mother’s face

is lit by ideas.  My father’s gestures

are a Frenchman’s.  When he concedes

a point, he shrugs, an elaborate lift

of the shoulders, his hands and smile

declaring an open mind.

I am five months old, at home with a sitter

this August night, when the air outside

is warm as a bath.  They decide,

though the car is parked nearby,

to walk the few blocks home, savoring

the fragrant night, their being alone together.

As they go out the door, he’s reciting

Donne’s “Canonization”: “For God’s sake

hold your tongue, and let me love,”

and she’s laughing, light

as summer rain when it begins.

Published in Everything Winged Must Be Dreaming and Sweet Confluence, New and Selected Poems