Beetlebung and Kettlehole--April Poems

Birthday Cake

The cake, out of the oven,
the icing, smooth,
just the way he likes it,
even if he can’t taste it
from thirteen hundred miles away,
but what the heck,
he is weaned for good
after he turned taller than me.
Now, his looks, still naïve,
find horizons of promise
while women around him melt,
and he still whimpers on the phone,
wanting to be himself,
with his books and scratchy music,
silently wishing for that extra slice.
Strange, how everything stays the same.
Strange, how everything floats away.