Poem: Effervescence

It’s 1951.

I’m eight.

The final curtain has fallen on that night’s production of “Pygmalion.”

My dad played Col. Pickering.

He has washed off the greasepaint and said his goodbyes.

Driving home over Martha’s Vineyard’s country roads,

The balmy summer midnight is too delicious to ignore.

At Oak Bluffs public beach, my parents swim naked.

Effervescence pours off their bodies.

I watch from the sand.