The Old Flame

My old flame, my wife! Remember our lists of birds? One morning last summer, I drove by our house in Maine. It was still on top of its hill, Now a red ear of Indian maize was splashed on the door. Old Glory with thirteen stripes hung on a pole. The clapboard was old-red schoolhouse red. Inside, a new landlord, a new wife, a new broom! Atlantic seaboard antique shop pewter and plunder shone in each room. A new frontier! No running next door now to phone the sheriff for his taxi to Bath and the State Liquor Store! No one saw your ghostly imaginary lover stare through the window and tighten the scarf at his throat. Health to the new people, health to their flag, to their old restored house on the hill! Everything had been swept bare, furnished, garnished and aired. Everything's changed for the best, how quivering and fierce we were, there snowbound together, simmering like wasps in our tent of books! Poor ghost, old love, speak with your old voice of flaming insight that kept us awake all night. In one bed and apart, we heard the plow groaning up hill, a red light, then a blue, as it tossed off the snow to the side of the road.