Improv' (1), Week Twelve

"The End of the Weekend," by: Anthony Hecht

A dying firelight slides along the quirt
Of the cast-iron cowboy where he leans
Against my father's book. The lariat
Whirls into the darkness. My girl, in skin-tight jeans,
Fingers a page of Captain Marryat,
Inviting insolent shadows to her shirt.

We rise together to the second floor.
Outside, across the lake, and endless wind
Whips at the headstones of the dead and wails
In the trees for all who have and have not sinned.
She rubs against me and I feel her nails.
Although we are alone, I lock the door.

The eventual shapes of all our formaless prayers,
This dark, this cabin of loose imaginings,
Wind, lake, lip, everything awaits
The slow unloosening of her underthings.
And then the noise. Something is dropped. It grates
Against the attic beams.
                                       I climb the stairs,

Armed with a belt.
                               A long magnesium strip
Of moonlight from the dormer cuts a path
Among the shattered skeletons of mice.
A great black presence beats its wings in wrath.
Above the boneyard burn its golden eyes.
Some small grey fur is pulsing in its grip.


Improvisation:

Tropical Snow
           -family owed and operated

The one-room hut, stacked with shelves of
flavor, marks the start of summer here. Being
a seasonal service, our shaved ice marinated
in tangerine-banana with drizzles of sweet
cream  leaves the town in a cavity of hibernation
through the drag of winter. So, with hours like one
to eleven-thirty, no native goes a day from April to
August without driving thru their heat with a snow
cone--from me. Until the summer of 2010. Turning
down the blinds, locking the dead-bolt, and, with one
flick of the finger, switching the lights, I closed shop
early to treat a new customer with a special tour.