How were we taught summer?
Watermelon seeds,
dusty roads,
secret swimming holes
and long afternoon yawns?
.
Did we find summer along the river?
Where the smell of cool water
Wafts up into dry grass
Now pungent in the early afternoon heat.
.
Or did summer arrive on an afternoon breeze?
Shaking loose memories
of ice cream cones
and three-month loves.
Who knows?
.
I think summer is more like the unrehearsed fibs
From a sweet toothed kid
Skipping stones across the river.
Oblivious to mom’s dinner calls,
But keen on the subtle aroma
of strawberry shortcake.
.
Or, was summer announced by the lazy wind chimes?
Their faint tolling, skipping a long beat,
Echoing across the empty porch,
And fading into places where time,
all stubborn and worn,
Sways in the rhythms between
Cicadas and sleeping dogs?
.
Surely summer is chattering creeks,
Long golden vistas,
Soft rattles of leaves,
Hot wind through grass,
The quiet hiss of a garden sprinkler.
.
And let’s not forget the cricket
And its solo serenade of evening.
.
Then again, maybe all this summer stuff
is just the long yawn
Between someplace new
and someplace remembered.
Shaken Rain 