Indian Summer


Against the rattle-clack background of Southshore trains
I was twelve
during Indian Summer come late in autumn as berries hung
along the Louisville and Nashville right-of-way, dangled
bright or dusky among the dying wild shrubs at the lakeside;
I was twelve
untouched, hurrying for the last fruit before winter
off the lake,
out of Canada, toward the vanished prairie of Indiana.
Twelve years untouched,
fast--full of corners--strong, I was quickly snapping
old vines turned crisp that cover the sweetest fruit;
I was twelve.

And he looked soft like a young girl
pretty in a Sunday dress
with bright hair curling
in the last summer winds
along the lake
and he came along the shrubs
almost dancing with a basket
full of ripened seed bulging against
his slim thighs
and when he stopped among the shrubs
looking over his shoulders I saw his
thin hand clasp gently the branch
his long fingers agile and tipped
with the sweet juice
of the crushed vine.

It was a shadow approaching soft as butterflies
quick as honeybees
come from nowhere to suck nectar from buds bright
under noonday suns in Springtime in Indiana against
the rattle-clack
twelve-thirty Southshore express train into Chicago.
I imagined myself that long train pushing in and out
of city after city, spilling my insides onto platforms
and, cooling awhile in the shade of the platforms,
waiting with a sigh afterward, never asking,
not knowing the name of this stranger or that
who rode the long sleek snake of the train
bright and quick in the broad daylight of midday sun.
I was twelve then.

And it was a minute divided into
one moment then a second moment
as I stood watching beside him
breathing steadily
and his teeth bit at his lower lip
like a girl ready to speak
though before her first word
I reached out and kissed her
while my left hand felt his spine
soften while he slipped down slowly
among the shrubs
at the lakeshore

Where the afternoon trains run in and out of Chicago
on the Southside amid the sounds of hurried passing
I was twelve
and straining to hear the slow low lisp
of the waves come late that Indian Summer
in autumn before the long Canadian cold and lonely ice
that shriveled the berries away and buried their seed
out of sight along the south shore of the lake where
honeybees and butterflies could be seen weaving slowly
among the thorns and the briars and tracks at the lake
and the faceless faces on the trains to Chicago
saw only the sharp curve of the shore.
I was a man.


John Horvath, Jr.




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