Late in the Calendar Year

What little you had may be going,
And you’re not sure how much you care,
How much you feel like rearranging,

Yet another time, the deck chairs.
You sit in the afternoon sun,
Your favorite part of living life,

And wonder about traditions
And habits—in dailiness, in art,
What counts as good or not.

Flocks of messages, gathered words,
Startle up from and resettle
On the cobbled square. You pretend

You’re there, pretend that you’re not there.
Was it better to state precisely
The doings within your awareness,

Or to focus on the skill of drawing
The scattered pigeons in air?
Would it have been better, then,

To train the pigeons, to learn them traits
By which you’d know your own flocks
Circling there, above the sinking square?

The waters are rising. The girl’s mother
Occasionally takes an interest in her
Daughter’s care. What little you had

You wasted contemplating waste
And the way it takes meanings to make,
And you’re not sure how much you care.