My son's 15th birthday today, coincident with our first real taste of summer. It's supposed to be 85 degrees here. What a shock to our damp, refrigerated systems. So not much writing will get done. Mostly I will be (1) making birthday dinner and (2) playing Monopoly.

Nonetheless, in James's honor, I will manage to post a poem I wrote a few years ago.

Diner

Dawn Potter

You fall into your window seat like a stork

spearing an alewife, my little cabbage,

and you eat so much cabbage! Chatter

harrows the fog-lit air. I wad napkins with spilt milk,

socks explode from your rat-tail shoes,

you suck two straws and snicker Farty Mart,

but when you have nothing else to say,

you say, I love you, Mom,

more times an hour than I can bear.

Oh my sweetheart, my barometer,

my wet-nose calf, my chick--

I grimace at a sudden knife of sun, you kick my chair

and bellow, What's wrong?

early-alert system, wired and ready,

grubby hackles spiked,

bitten fingernail held to the wind.

Moo a tune, you can't fool me.

I hear you:

Look out, a big one's brewing, batten the hatches,

I love you, Mom,

I'm ducking my head,

I love you, Mom, I'm ready to run.

[forthcoming in How the Crimes Happened (CavanKerry Press, 2010)].

Birthday dinner menu: teriyaki steak, new potatoes and parsley, first green beans of the season, beet greens, roasted red peppers, marble layer cake with fudge frosting, raspberries, lemonade.