A Poem by Ruth Bavetta

Last of the Summer Wine

The silver bracelet around my wrist
was forged from snakes and desert air.
All around me figs and honey
gathered moths with crayoned wings.
As the colors flowed and fused,

I ran to join the festival.
There, among the rhymes that failed,
I drank champagne and laughed and sang
without a thought of coins or shoes
or where the other guests had gone.

When the tide swarmed through the door
and the lanterns sizzled out, I was left
to burn my fingernails for light.
The sea was dark and deep and cold,
but as I sank below the waves,
I held my ten small lamps aloft
and birds flew down to kiss the flames

Ruth Bavetta is an artist and poet whose poems have been published in Rhino, Rattle, Nimrod, Tar River Poetry, North American Review, Spillway, and Poetry New Zealand, and many others.  Her work is included in four anthologies.  She has published two books, Embers on the Stairs (Moontide Press) and Fugitive Pigments (FutureCycle Press).  Two more books, No Longer at this Address (Tebot Back) and Flour, Water, Salt (FutureCycle Press) are forthcoming.  She loves the light on November afternoons, the smell of the ocean, a warm back to curl against in bed.  She hates pretense, fundamentalism and sauerkraut.