Vacation Reel

A hint of yellow around every edge

and white scratches like shooting stars

but my god, you, stepping out of our ’56 Ford

and onto the beach, you slipping out of your shoes,

the wind filling your hair and there

from behind your skirt a little girl with matching face,

just-walking, falling to the sand, brushing off

and running crying from the waves

and into your arms to be twirled high

in the air, your lips saying look, look

at daddy but mostly the way you looked at me,

then, as if to say, see what you’ve done, and what’s more

if you’re good we’ll do it again just maybe

and oh I was very very good.

And did you know at the time—does anyone

know?—that this would be your best time,

that your smile would never again be so true,

those legs, flashing in and out of sight,

never so inviting, so quick to dance, this 8-millimeter

life now swimming in amber would taste

the sweeter year after year even as and because

we would so soon stop believing in such summers,

flickers of doubt finding their way

into your eyes, captured by a single frame or two

but all the more painful to watch now

for all your trying then, your impossibly red lips

and bleached-out hands blowing kisses

willy-nilly into the wind?