(Thanks to Beth Muccio)

Summer scent on the breeze & pushcart pretzels I think of,

subway heat beneath NY snow or the damp salt of Cape

blankets when the leaves outside seem to drip

green upon the curling calendars that time in our fingers

flip the photo blossoms of while our breath is a stamp,

our flesh, just packages, the tape, the strings,

the pungent, the brown, unwrapping any landscape’s

familial face as a phoning friend, an in-transit lover

between the pages of some scrapbook where fragrances wait

to press upon, to seize.

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 Resident artist/curator for The Chroma Museum, artistic renderings of LGBTQI historical figures, organizations and allies predominantly before Stonewall, https://thestephenmeadchromamuseum.weebly.com/ ,Stephen Mead is a retiree whom, throughout all his pretty non-glamorous jobs still found time for writing poetry/essays and creating art.  Occasionally he even got paid of this. Currently he is trying to sell his 40-year backlog of unsold art before he pops his cogs, Art Collection from Stephen Mead