Not Even A Drop Poem by Robert Rorabeck

If the night sings, then the days get busy,
Boisterous almost- The airplanes never let up
They go by their ways of fishermen as busily
As maidens leaping beneath all those stars,
The junked satellites ceasing to wink, forgetting
Their managements:
And this is true, that I don’t really understand the
Paper tombs, the happy exploits of paperboys by
Their expanding routes, the professors in their
Ancient caps, the beautifully young wives,
And the red bricks they all play in well stacked and
So very high: So, toss your hair as you will quite
Carelessly, not even looking at me or contemplating
To explain this: I am not drunk anymore,
Not drunk over nothing, I am quite dry- Like a fish
Who has evolved, who has discovered some new formula
And sits quite slyly in the grass wide-eyed and brilliantly
Smoking his pipe, waiting for the man who might have
Been his father, if he’d only thought something more
Of the sea,
All the ways to go, and by what means you plan to use
To get what you want out of it; but now I can’t even think,
Because you’ve walked by and the day is so busily empty,
And I have not had even a dropp to drink.