Lake John

I sat there listening to the rain. The storm everyone was talking about was rolling in, I smelled heat and earth with the air funneling in from the West. The gentleman next to me seemed to be studying his thoughts while he ate slowly. His shoulders cringed with every course of sporadic wind. I could hear his fork clinking against his teeth and noticed that his gray eyes were like mirrors of the sky, glimmering with shocks of lightning on the horizon. I liked this meal. Green beans with red onions and honey glazed bacon, zucchini fritters, heirloom corn bread, and lamb burger with nasturtium flowers placed on the rim of the platter. The chef's wife twice visited my table, we discussed my new book and her extended hiatus from writing poetry. I was pleased to walk past a row of Delphiniums on my exiting the restaurant by way of the garden path. They stood haunting the evening with their electric blue frames, like mermaids in a starlit sea. I wanted to observe the storm clouds along Lake John every day for the rest of my life.