All photographs are by Russell Bittner

O c t o b e r

If fall portends a final rest
stop far from our late plummet,
let’s dip into your wedding chest
and grab a grommet from it

to rile the scam and halt our skid
a plum’s throw from the summit,
of where, from wiser eyes, we hid—
like hedonists—to slum it

beneath the skirts of a brazen maid
whose bawdiness once beckoned
to frenzied folks on lemonade
and squeezing every second

out of a life that would parade
to hucksters of reliance
both gallimaufry and charade
of personal defiance.

[]