from Crossing State Lines [Shirtsleeved afternoons]

Shirtsleeved afternoons
turn toward leather as the trees
blush, scatter a last

few bright, weary wisps across
the great bruised heart of the South.

The spirit cup drifts
down the pond's moon-sparked highway.
Far laughter, shadows.

Love or poison? Your turn. Drink
to the star-drenched latitudes!

Copyright © 2011 by Rita Dove. From Crossing State Lines, edited by Bob Holman and Carol Muske Dukes. Reprinted with the permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux.