“Everything’s there
As part of the comical study
Of how to love time.”
– Lisa Robertson, “Earth in Lucretius”
At last! I found where the ice cream truck lives
at a small cottage house on Sweet Home Road
where the Emperor sleeps after chores until dawn
with mechanical music stuffed in his head.
I’ll post a picture if you don’t believe me.
That’s the name of the road, for real!
I heard him out late and followed
past dusk, past the Shwarma stand,
and the Free Parking lot all blocked off,
the Episcopal Church with flags half-mast
(remembering . . .
Las Vegas? Galicia?
Mogadishu? Myanmar? . . .)
“Stranglers of peace don’t eat ice cream.”
(The Emperor won’t let them –
I just know that he won’t.)
No children were chasing the truck last night,
no running around streets past dark.
But I can do as I please, at my age, by stealth
I followed the Emperor of Ice Cream.
Why was he out in October?
Ice cream is a summer month.
It always has been, as everyone knows.
But I learned he was just going home.
It was too dark to see, when he stepped off the truck,
too bad, but I waved nonetheless
for all of those years down all of those streets
where the coins in our pockets were somehow
enough.
Cheryl Emerson
October, 2017
