maybe I’d be happy
if I could only eat raspberries,
pinkish-red, tart, sticky-sweet

soft fruit skin bubbles 
becoming tiny hats
dancing on playful fingers

under a setting sun
in the distance
where neighborhood kids gather
at dark for a game of manhunt

after the power goes out
for the third time this week
and everyone emerges from their homes
to make small talk with neighbors they barely know

to stave off loneliness
to press through the heat
of another summer passing by