Drinking Honeysuckle in Palo Alto

Walking near Gamble Garden we came upon
Young girls hovering over honeysuckle blooms
Like bees, biting off tips and sucking
The sharp sweetness--drop by drop.

My just such girlhood pushed up from
Mind's bottom and fought for air:
Kicking and flailing to break water's surface
And beat off bully Time, whose fat palm
Shoved against my face until lungs gave out and
Memory dropped back like an old tire
Into the silt of Welika Lake.

For a moment, before we resumed our conversation,
I was overcome by humidity and the trickle
Of sweat running down pancaked legs
Blurring white shoes with hopeless longing
For Dr. Moore to stop praying for life after death.

[Poem by Virginia McKinnon Mann. June, 1993.]