The lychee and mango are ripening
against sapphire blue, the air scented
with notes of green pepper and salt.
Circulation slows but there’s a quickening
to the linger, pregnant as these days are
with swelling sun and swelter. Finding
little respite from distended clouds,
stay.
We were taught to count –
one, one hundred, two, potato, three, chimpanzee –
the time between concussive thunder and the
lightning strike. The better advice is, if you can hear it,
run.
The rain comes hard and you wonder
mostly how the clouds held out so long,
aggrieved as they clearly were
by the weight. It’s the hours after
the storm, when the far away sky is
dancing in step and the frogs are singing
their atonal love songs and the stage lights
have dimmed and it smells of ozone and earth,
that we pause to miss moments not yet
counted, numbering now the time between
togetherness and inevitable dispersal, and
sit.
caroline ridgway 