The Colony at Malibu

Glassy-eyed on Scotch, my brother and I watchedthe electric faces of waves, and I said that nobodyreally gets drunk in poems anymore and gets away

with it. Not like William Matthews did. But weare drunk, he said, and getting away with itat this borrowed château in the colony.

We all harbor a private sadness, I said.Melancholia, he said. Melancholia, I said.Melancholia, confirmed the moon in Morse code,

and the ocean certainly knew what it felt like—eachwave another failed attempt at becoming. People here,I said, must take great pride      in the celebrated virgins

of Pepperdine      who graze in the pastureof finance and literature      for all the practicalreasons. Was that Keats? he asked as he poured

a few neat fingers of Glenmorangie Artein.Keats had the heart of a sparrow, I said, alwayssniveling over the things he would never have.

Like this beach, he said. Like these waves, I said.