After her first furtive kiss
under the cattail walking bridge
during a camp twilight canoe ride,
there was a new sultry nuance
to the sensual expression
“A soft summer night.”
 
A new fragrance.
A new taste.
A new tingle.
A new craving to explore and tease.
A new hungry flame to be fanned
by a moonlit glassy lake breeze.
 
An insatiable summer secret... to be kept
from everyone, especially from her Mother,
as she awaits in her blossoming velvet ripeness,
glistening in the soft silent shadows of her
back bungalow room keenly listening, waiting
and wishing for that worn hall floorboard to
vaguely squeak like a cat’s awakening yawn,
night after balmy night, all summer vacation long,
until the hint of candlelight just before dawn.
 
Fast family years later, Thanksgiving.
Mother with daughter in glowing pride
watch son-in-law John with grands, nieces
and nephews all running full stride, laughing,
having holiday family fun playing touch football
on a leafy brown backyard fall lawn.
 
After dinner, while preparing the table for dessert,
Mother, now “Nana”, casually drops a family bomb.
Announces quite proudly, like it was her golden
secret family plan all along, that she knew all about
that squeaky floorboard in that bungalow hall.
Said “Nana” once had a squeaky floorboard, too, and
allowed that sleeping cat to awaken all those nights
with a yawn all that hot sophomore summer long.
Said it was her who “chose” John.
 
In the pin drop “Whisky Tango Foxtrot”
silence that followed, she then asked
Who wants apple pie?
Anyone?
How about you, John?


© by Edward Ferri, Jr.
Used with the author's permission.