True Luminosity

We watch one woman, two men, two little
thin girls at the edge of land and water
with its aquamarine, blue-green to azure
waves in May. White beach sand. North

Florida. They fly two rainbow kites
in late spring wind. It's 6:15 in the evening.
We two friends sit sipping wine, waiting for pink
sunset. "Today's a clear day," one of us says.

"This sun's not too hot." Little girls giggle,
run from one man's tight string back to theirs.
One Japanese-y, round, cylinder-like kite
tilts, flies high, as if it's true luminosity.

A kite shaped like a big blue bird flies too.
Real gray pelicans buzz in over the beach
in formations of sixes, beaks straight east.
But the colorful kites fly too high

in the violet sky. Suddenly one man lets one kite
fly free, accidentally. The kite floats
right up to the sky -- over white condo tops!
String catches in the green palm trees too tall

to climb. He plots a plan to land it.
He fails. Finally, string loose, the kite flies
clear up to what was once imagined as God.
Irridescent kites flying up, out of sight.

- Labyrinth