and we pull the fog out of our eyes
and the tangles from our hair
and rub our tanned maps of faces
as the sun starts ressurect itself
and shines on the sand, white as sin,
and illuminates the waves
and tom shakes out the blanket he bought
when we were in mexico
( 5 dollars, gringo! said the leering man in the mercado
 we ate sweet mangoes every day and wished
we could save all the strays)
and sammy is pulling things out of
her once white backpack
strawberries only slightly sweetly rotten
and juice from the bargain bin that we pour into the cups
where we normally keep our gin,
our jack
and i light one up and try not to let the smoke find its way
into carlos' face
( you're killing yourself with those things, you know)
and i rub some loose ash into my jeans and wonder
if the previous owner smoked too
and sally stands up and runs suddenly like
a girl posessed
into the hands of the ocean
laughing like a maniac while carlos groans
and throws a strawberry halfheartedly torwards
her crazy figure
before getting up to join her
and i rub more ash into my jeans and
tell myself that we live the dream
that we are the best of the wandering generation
because we sleep within the stars
and we haunt the alleys
and whisper ideas into the ears of the college kids
we are richer than others, i think, tom and sammy and carlos and me,
because we read poetry in the cemeteries
and toast each other with cheap strawberry wine
and when we see families on the beach
we turn our heads
and refuse to mourn the part of us that died
(or never really lived at all)
and i stub out my cigarette in the sand, white as faith,
and join my friend carlos and my friend sammy and my friend tom
and i know that we are richer than others because
we sleep within the stars and wear cheap sweaters
and dance in our impatient youth, and we wear out
our deteriorating dreams because it is always,
always, our last day of summer