The Young in New York

Rebecca Pyle

Buttercream are the
Young, all fresh on the
Table, the strange flatness
Of their hair. That strange
Overlapping N and Y on
The Yankees caps mean
New and Young. I heard
Today young bellhop laughing, saying
The beach doesn’t open till tomorrow.  
So guess what? Today it’s against
The law to swim in the ocean.
That’s the best
Of being young: the insouciance.

I think I know the meaning of that
Word: words sculpt themselves
With time, insouciance.

Buttercream, the young, new
And so easily fit in shoes, but so
Frightened of the surf, the decades
How they tilt you, like shoes, toward

Sun. And the sun robs
You, recharges you, robs you,
Alternating waves, currents, each
Side having a different idea what
A shore is, whether youth, or
Newness, or death, all oppositions,
All crew, all pirates, all robbery,
Just as milk and cream and butter
Are robbery: from cows.

Rebecca Pyle’s poetry the past few years is in Underwater New York, Indian Review, Poor Yorick, and Cobalt Review; her short stories are in Map Literary, Lindenwood Review, and Stoneboat. Rebecca lives in Utah, not far from the Great Salt Lake, and is also an artist; her artwork is in New England Review and Watershed Review. See rebeccapyleartist.com.