Nostalgia

I often think of the vintage--
how close it is to extinction.
Does it want to leap off the cliff
like a burdened man distraught

by the heaping of mortgage and bills?
Or the run down Camaro trying
to soar down the gravel like dented
metal bending on the road.

The black of cracked leather seats,
the hatch of a mashed dash-board,
the glint of its sun-beaten paint job
where color was young once.

And what about those leather seats
that arch upward, rising like a spine
with poise? Guilty for all the bliss
of housing roundness to its lap.

If the cushion's maw had a say,
there would be much to mouth
after the leaving of tender scent.
I can only imagine the head rest

tilting back after years of fermenting
the sweated skin of summer bodies
sitting on its pelt. Think of the radio
knob, how so many hands have turned

it to feel the frequency of melody,
there is something pensive in the worn
memories of the vintage. And nothing
can replace the past, nothing would

want to remove the gift of perfume
drifting in a Camaro.