The moon is a blue ball that floats

in Lake Michigan, or perhaps a hole

torn through the surface. Couples gather
 
on the shore to be drawn from their children,
 
their work, here to be seduced again into lovers.
 
The women sigh. Their skin darkens. Their eyes 

become white in the evening. The men contemplate 

and consider; their hands soften and grip a shoulder
 
or comb through hair. The children, at home, see 

the blue ball and sing themselves asleep.


 
But this lovely interlude comes later.  

First, the women and the men must find

and disappoint one another. The eyes will

become severe and the hands grow callused 

from chores, from worry, from even handed

meanness. The children must interrupt the lovers

as they try to charm one another. That is the slow, 

meticulous, predictable part and will expand  

for longer than they believe anything might, 

except perhaps a lake or a sky, both at night

split open, making space to admit a moon.

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