ODE TO THE ICE CREAM LINE

by Jonny Teklit

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it is april & the weather this evening, god,
the weather is caramelizing us
in only the way the first warm night after
a cold, snowless winter can. nowhere is this
more obvious than the line at the ice cream shop—
a throng of people, myself among them, lined up
outside beneath the newly bloomed ginkgo trees,
in shorts and tank tops and dresses,
two clearly in the business casual attire they wore
to work that day, one with a soccer ball tucked under
their glistening arm, another on the phone with their beloved
asking what they want. that question, of course,
on all of our minds as we study the chalkboard of flavors
and possible combinations— lemon curd coriander streusel,
sea salt caramel, black sesame, cookie dough— and i can’t help
but chuckle, in that quiet breathy way, you know,
at the thought of us all, mostly adults, coming from
our respective jobs and homes and community sports games
in search of some soft sweetness for the child in each of us,
that spends most of its time anxious or scared or confused or
angry or otherwise curled up so small in the silent chapel
of our body that we often forget they’re there, 
our tenderest self, but look: here, the sweetness is dripping
down your fingers, the bricks in the sidewalk are mortared
with it, the crickets are rubbing their little violin legs in it,
it’s in your hair, in the trees, in the careful deciding
of the toddler behind me, his sweet face scrunched with thought;
what i’m trying to say is the sweetness is everywhere. oh,
come closer, you’ve got some in the corner of your mouth.

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Jonny Teklit is a recipient of the 2019 Aliki Perroti and Seth Young Most Promising Young Poet Award. His work has appeared in The Atlantic, The New Yorker, The Academy of American Poets, Catapult, and elsewhere. He is currently an MFA candidate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.