Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Tomatoes and Midday Cicadas
Where are the songs of Spring?
-Keats
The tomatoes are split and discolored in the heat
Like bathing beauties who have beached too long
And gathering up the past totter home at dusk
Surprised to be all burnt and wrinkled with age
The sun of April who was a lusty lover
Caressing and warming their soft young skin
Is now a middle-aged man baring his chest
And seeking love in other vegetable beds
The cicadas of noon mourn in the withering heat
In remembrance of spring, youthful and sweet
