The first purple wisteria <br />I recall from boyhood hung <br />on a wire outside the windows <br />of the breakfast room next door <br />at the home of Steve Pisaris. <br />I loved his tall, skinny daughter, <br />or so I thought, and I would wait <br />beside the back door, prostrate, <br />begging to be taken in. Perhaps <br />it was only the flowers of spring <br />with their sickening perfumes <br />that had infected me. When Steve <br />and Sophie and the three children <br />packed up and made the move west, <br />I went on spring after spring, <br />leaden with desire, half-asleep, <br />praying to die. Now I know <br />those prayers were answered. <br />That boy died, the brick houses <br />deepened and darkened with rain, <br />age, use, and finally closed <br />their eyes and dreamed the sleep <br />of California. I learned this <br />only today. Wakened early <br />in an empty house not lately <br />battered by storms, I looked <br />for nothing. On the surface <br />of the rain barrel, the paled, <br />shredded blossoms floated.<br /><br />Philip Levine<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/wisteria/
