Summer Blues

by Kelli Ann Brommel

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Oh Summer

You Bacchanalian bimbo

Divulging the neighbor’s nipples

As he sweeps ‘cross his carpet of sod.

Oh Summer

With your runners running

Humidity oiling abdominal obliques.

Plan as we may to stay clad,

Comfort defeats all modesty-

Shorty shorts in the produce aisle,

Speckled cleavage in canned goods.

We’re on display—so many bare chassis—

Old and young, no shade from

Your stank, your sun-washed tremors.

Oh Summer

You devilish trickling rivulet of

Perspiration ‘tween butt cheeks,

Crackled leg veins like flooded rivers

In stubbled deforestation.

I want to wear pants, you spoiler.

I crave knit scarves and sweaters.

Your swatters of flies and

Wing-borne disease be gone.

Some summers ere past you were free, lazy days

Garter snakes and toads

Strawberry barefoot ripe tomato cookout

Popsicle cantaloupe squirt gun fireworks

Kayaking cloud shapes running in sand

Reading all day

Double feature drive-in.

Don’t think I don’t remember,

But Summer

Your seductions are blatant to a wizened eye,

A seasoned half-century palate.

You’re bad for a blue-eyed, Irish-white

Ginger bedecked in freckled constellations.

I’ve no defense against you,

You brilliant hot-air buffoon.

Oh Summer

Someday your storms may kill us all,

Wind tearing off what’s left of our clothes,

Tides submerging home and land.

It’s not melodrama, comparing your ways to the end of days:

Heat’s apocalyptic when you’re the ant under glass.

Oh Summer

You beat-boxing threat of early death,

At least you give us gardens.

We can vegetate in rootless, fruitless yearning,

Long for a cool brush of mothwing.

Summer, I was born to your embrace.

Still kicking and bawling, I yield,

Casting off garments and hair,

Till I’m just as I was when we met-

Simple and raw, at your mercy.