Uncle Ray

I couldn’t help myself –

            well actually I did –

to a burger and a brat

            off his grill,

and I laughed

            heartily at him

as he faced with chagrined

            humor, the spot on the roof

from where he had tossed the dog’s Frisbee 

            off not many minutes earlier –

I should know,

            I held a glass of iced tea

and my end of the ladder we had just carried

            back to the barn.

And from my rocking chair on the deck

             I heard his formula one racer

screaming through the trees

            and cutting over the grass

his hands and eyes coordinating

            the horizontal flight.

And then later in the darkening light

            on the far side of the pond

two figures, his nephew and he, I could see dimly,

            close enough to hear the click, click, click

of the frogs and the lighter,

            then a momentary orange glow,

then sparks trailing from a fuse,

            then pale legs running away so fast

I could scarcely tell the man from the boy.

            One aerial missile burst

much nearer the ground than the air

            but nobody died

and ninety-nine more streaked higher

            toward the stars

and then exploded

            into a million colored embers

drifting like fallen patriots

            back to the earth

dark by then, but I still counted

            each one and myself lucky

to have witnessed the spectacular show.

            Still I sat through the national anthem

sang by a folk rock bass near the water lilies,

            but by the rocket’s red glare

I saw that my youth was still there

            And the red white and blue

flew bright in the night

            on the fourth

at Uncle Ray’s farm.