Because the wind outflanked us,
Or the rain filled our pockets,
Dissolving our notes,
Or we caught up on our reading,
A pound at a time,
Or the sea, as it crawled on its belly
Toward the dunes,
Shouted us down,
Or the casual pairs of young clerks,
Escaped from D.C. in Subarus,
Stripped to their pretty underwear
And, bounding into the wild, cold surf,
Whooped with sensation in the riptide,
Carried away,
Or Soutine, in Paris without freon,
Painted a carcass of beef which
He washed each day with a bucket of blood
Collected from the butcher by his girlfriend,
Reglistening,
Or a good woman is hard to find,
Or the moon,
I forgot to mention the moon.
—Title and ultimate line from a poem of the same name by David Berman.
