Long Day's Journey Into Night--And Back Again

I have gone back and forth on the name of this poem ... even on this site. I'm settling on this because the Eugene O'Neill connotation fits.

Long Day's Journey Into Night—And Back Again

By Annmarie Lockhart

Backyard barbecue at the Jersey shore,
ocean to the right and bay to the left,
waves lay down percussion through the day,
louder through the night, underscoring Bruce
(I swear Tunnel of Love was the only song we heard the entire 36 hours).

People pass through, come and go,
but we sit catatonic in the middle of the chaos—
or is it an island of calm?—
drinking Coronas and Coors as the melted day reshapes into semisolid night
and liquefies back down again.

There was the untouched dinner, the driveby, the phone calls,
the hours of dissecting discussion, and then:
someone turned out the stars,
and the fingers of the sun spread open from the far edge of the ocean
and grabbed hold of the sea-swept day
while the waves threw up jellyfish onto the empty beach.

 

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