Clouds hang low and heavy-gray
against dusky smoldered skies
humidity so thick it weighs you down,
a childhood security blanket clasped
too tight against the throat.
Summer’s so near you can almost touch it,
gray skies bringing it in from the gulf
everyone all dewy with that southern belle glow
and those Bermuda shorts that just won’t die,
a moist promise in the air.
Lulling drum of air energizes and makes sluggish
drawing sweet heavy-thick sighs from mouths,
’til time itself is drugged
spinning long days, and closed-in nights,
stirred up emotions, and harboring no peace.
The Wind carries a strong edge tongit,
a simmering unhappiness lurks beneath the lull
which smacks of an inherent, subversive malice;
and I wait, uneasy; unable to grasp this response
something so internal and dark and vaguely primitive.
The evening drives boys to bottles and fights,
girls to lights and a temporary balm for the vulnerabilities,
and lovers spring up with the first sweet-corn shoots
while I wait, listening for the first hard gulf breeze
that contains the realization underlying the air.