I Wait in a Line Outside for Green Beer

 I Wait in a Line Outside For Green Beer

I said ‘Leprechaun, why do we
try too hard, you and I?’ He said
‘O does it grieve me, woman,
that you do not use the past tense.’

I wait in a line outside for
green beer along with what looks like
everyone else in the city
on a night, still winter, that must
be in the mid-seventies. “Dress
for me,” read his note, hand-written
and sultry in a way that makes
me expect something, so (for him)
it is a twenties’ dress with a
feather skirt, a rope of pearls, no
stockings and insolent-heeled shoes,
the kind with expectations of
their own. (They are known to dangle
from the toe or inflict other
good dangers if they are noticed.)
A year ago I was here, in
the same dress and shoes, with Brenda.
She ordered drinks, then turned to me.
‘Why so sad? You look good enough
to eat.’ She spread her arms wide. ‘You
could have anyone in this place.
You could have anyone.’ She died
last fall after the hurricane,
before anyone, otherwise
she would be here with me tonight
to scold, to drink enough to see
leprechauns, to make them jealous
and then laugh as we walked them home.