Swamp Fever (Poetry)

First love is like swamp fever
running wild about the blood
dying down for a long season
like you never thought it would
then it flares again so sudden
when you’re older and unsure
if the symptoms ever left you
or there’s meant to be a cure.

Greying hair will not deny it
nor the years that skitter by
for the tongue remembers honey
and a hot tear haunts the eye
when it threatens flesh with feeling —
that red-raw familiar ache
so unsettling but welcome
if just for old time’s sake.

Love reviving in that instant
when he sees her on the street —
a mere glimpse — his heart is pumping
and his body floods with heat
as the moment hangs — infectious
he considers what to say
spies the gold ring on her finger
swallows hard ... and walks away.