Untitled 9-11-10
Hugh Scott-Symonds

A Case for Hedonism

Amy Ashton Handy

I never hear about glee anymore.

What happened to drinking whole bottles of wine

with a friend

and smiling wildly through teeth turned purple,

and the hopes for small things

fulfilled like bread

baking, yeast explosions that scent the air

before the pride of a meal well served

to your guests, a meal crowned by crusty

steaming sustaining substantial bread that drinks

the butter and

then shines the lips

and the first twinge of infatuation – yes, that old cliché but

fuck it we all felt

expansive stomach churning, no sleep,

fantasy in color,

and why can’t we talk about that,

and about tracing hearts and silent I-love-yous onto the upturned

palm of a boy who hadn’t yet heard you speak the words

but who tucked a flower behind your ear and told you that you looked like

a goddess because he never read

poetry or anything

that would help him come up with something better,

but watching him weave on his feet in a fog of cigarette smoke,

you knew that in that moment you were a euphoric goddess?

And I’d like to hear about bare-butt babies,

gurgling, drooling, sour milk-smelling

fist flailing, smooth skinned babies.

and sunshine mornings

when you sleep, you know, past noon

until, even when you clench your eyelids,

the sun still tweaks them open

and reminds you that this day is yours –

Yours!

and how you wake up knowing that you’ll never get

to do all of the things you’d planned

for yourself, like making sun tea and

napping by the pool with the paper forgotten on the kitchen table

even if you just slept well past noon

so you can stay up all night

buying rounds of shots for momentary friends

who will forget you by tomorrow,

as you will forget them,

as they fade into your impressionistic

memory that is one night

at a smelly

sawdusty pool-tabled music jammed

bar admiring one woman you will never meet

and don’t want to,

but her you won’t

forget, for the light that caught on each spiral of her curls –

how it glimmered there – and for her skin tight against muscle

and for her look of curious self wonder

at the knowledge that we all found her beautiful,

because she was.

and all about driving,

driving for the hell of it on desert roads that wind

through red mesas, singing

the songs you learned on road trips past when your father reached to

tickle you and asked

Do you know who this is?

and you did –

it was the Beatles

and you sang about how much she loves you

yeah yeah yeah.

No, I won’t talk about that,

about the Beatles or the babies or the hedonistic wine guzzling,

and certainly not about wandering drives through the desert 

because we must pay attention

to what really matters,

to being alert with caution or fear,

to the hung shirt, sullen,

needing the iron when