Every evening, up in my room,
I try to write but Chicago is hot
and it’s better outside,
strolling along the Lake or driving anywhere
with the windows down.
You sound good,
if undecided about things.
My life gets better no matter
how hard I try to make it worse.
No medicine for a month now;
no poems, either.
I can’t recall my last
spontaneous erection.
I’d blame it all on the heat
but you’d know better.
Summer in Chicago
makes people accessible
and I’ve become chatty
in these later years.
I find that talking small with people
oiled and stretched like tarps
on Pratt Avenue Beach
trumps any summer attempt
at revising a poem winter
revisions never made right.
We’ll see if my new affair
with society lasts. How long will I
continue to meet strangers
who introduce me
to myself?
deuce coupe 
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