Nighttime Swimming

There are miles to go, I know,
and miles behind.

Eyes mesmerized by streetlights,
I see the blur
that comes from hours of swimming
and know the blur
is but my haloed vision.

I have drowned the boy I was,
but not the thirst
that comes from nighttime swimming,
or reversed,
begins each day with coffee, tea or milk.

I think myself reluctant,
but I'm not,
not even on my worst days.
I betray
what's clearly in my interest,
and give away the secrets I love
and that give me my identity:
I flood.

Tears, fear and shame come easy.
Such are the moods
that strike like summer lightning,
blow like rain
on Hoosier afternoons
and pull a train
of memory in their wake:

the lovely smell
of earth and grass and moisture,
the swell of breasts
and hard prick's strain;
experience I remember.

Still, it's plain
that when rain finally stops
and curbs take up
from streets that day's collection,
those streams run off,
first find their way to gutters
then to drains.

I'm thankful for my body,
pipes that still remain
as conduits, tubes and channels,
still unblocked,
and viaducts that carry
lymph and blood

and waste and sweat and urine
given off
by pleasure and by habit,
while up above
the moisture of my praise
collects to clouds.