Afternoon

The needle is still moving on Hemingway’s record player
And the French doors to the veranda move gently in the afternoon breeze
A glass of whiskey, which he poured
Sweating in the sticky heat
The unbearable smell of wet paint

In this summer of wisteria
Southern shadows stretch eastward
And a watch still ticks in the neatly folded room
Aside picture frames and books
The dust invisible in twilight

No living human could make this quiet
This stillness of an Indian summer
Exhaling amber light into autumn
Like quiet pages of scripture
Or the gallows on Sunday

What if the phone rang
And the mockingbird chorus with the hum of heat and cicadas
Reached your ear
Though too late to turn back
Suddenly as surprised as everyone else