When Pat Boone
bought in a fit
of urgent
love
between an old man and
old machine
a Fairlane sedan
still wore
original mint green
with white trim and matching
interior
chrome horn
metal dash
white walls
from a good year
fifty-seven
after Korea, before Vietnam –
Eisenhower,
when people knew their
place
and Pat Boone
topped the charts
Water
So this 25 year old
dies
and the EMT personnel
transport her
corpse
down the corridor
to the elevator
not quite to the
trash bin
but very close.
she decided to
die
by drowning
in her bathtub.
a few days ago
with San Pellegrino in hand
she had smiled in the lobby;
i pushed the button for
our floor.
Daniel N. Nelson is an international consultant based in Alexandria, VA. He studied at the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminar and has published, in addition to over twenty volumes on matters related to international politics, a collection of poems: Performance (Wombat Press, Nova Scotia, 1994).