Late summer

The swallows won't sleep

They're swooping restless

In the deepening pool

Above the fading garden.

Even as the trees stiffen

They’re shrieking and calling,

Turning and leaping

Like the boys of Punta Negra,

Who lept from high rocks

For the gasps of tourists,

Threatening their diminutive frames

In an obscure game

Of endless summer.

But for whose eyes

When the backs have turned?

When the plates are white

And the moon is glowing?

They’re their still;

Turning, calling, rising,

Long after the glasses are emptied

In the blackening space

Above of our defeat.