STAYING UP LATE FOR FIREWORKS

Our beach fire blazes, sending sparks
against hot sweaty fingers
squeezing the last blackened marshmallow
unto a grubby graham cracker
held tenderly by a trusting toddler.
“Time for the show?” she questions,
as we wipe white goo from her lips
and pull her flying fingers away from
the dying points of the sparkler wire.

A black curtain of sky rises
over stars who never get bad press,
still famous after all these years.
We seek to compete
by pinching a splintered match
between our fumbling fingers.
Loud bright pinpricks
of light blossom and sputter,
sporadically fluttering into blankness.

The seasoned stars just smile.
Their friends in the cloud chorus shout,
“Let us show you how it’s done!”
With a burst of pink and lavender hues,
the clouds’ contours illuminate
the sky in lightning bolts of electricity
connecting every star,
interlocking webs of luminosity.

Silver strikes outline distant dunes across the bay
tracing the neighbor’s whimpering white pine,
throwing shadows of surprise into
the child’s wide open eyes.
Their show goes on and on. Finally
we throw a pail full of water
on the flickering bonfire. Pick up
the sleepy toddler, our own
blackened canisters, spent matches.

We walk toward the cottage
as the sky still smiles and the clouds still sing.