One Day Closer To Autumn

The air is still steamy, but there was a change in the light today. It was a little clearer, a little brighter, a little less like something seen through a muddy telescope. The air conditioner is humming again, but I was able to shut it off for about twenty four hours, til late this afternoon. The end of summer is finally in sight.

Emily likes the heat even less than I do, which always makes me laugh since she's nowhere near my bulk. She's lying on the bed wearing jean shorts and a tank top, her sandals are tucked neatly under the edge of the bed. Her hair is in a ponytail and she's wearing silver earrings shaped like sunbursts. It occurs to me that I've never seen her in shorts before, and now I wish I had!

Earlier we took a walk up Henry Street. One of the guys smoking cigarettes outside the Henry Street Ale House looked at us and smiled, offered me a high five. I was gonna ignore it, but Emily said, "Damn Jim, he's saying I'm hot! So slap him some!" I did. Cos she is!

When we got back here, with two pints of ice cream, Emily took the bowls off the shelf and began scooping. In my entire sixty seven years on this planet I have never known anyone who likes ice cream as much as Emily does.

And now she's sleeping, with an ice cream smile on her lips and the Skunk sleeping on her tummy. I love her, and I love him, and if that ain't happiness, well then, there ain't no such thing!

August 13th
My father would have been 99 today, had he not drunk himself to death at 72. He was borne on Friday the 13th, but that still doesn't excuse what he did. Hope he is paying for it now. Goodnight.
I survived you, asshole!

August is the birthday

It's the birthday of  too many people who mean less than nothing to me. Walking up and down Sixth Avenue back in the bad old days, when the hookers owned the West Side Highway and the chance for redemption lived somewhere south of The Ramrod.

My dad would swear that didn't  matter to him, but if you believe that, cover your asshole!

My so-called friend  Mindy borrowed tons of cash, GFY Whore! Yeah, the world is only six thousand years old, but where does the Bibble say you can rip off your friends?

No comment, no surprise. Do not EVER contact me again!

August Is Breathing Down Your Neck

The waves are growing cooler. Not cold, but not warm like last month, when the sun made all the difference. The sand feels gritty underfoot, and the Sun looks like it's shrinking smaller every night, in the west. Soon enough Orion will rise, and the beaches will be empty, and lonely. It all reminds me of a night more than forty years ago, when we kissed under the maple tree by the old wooden bridge over the bay, hating that when dawn came you would be gone.

And later you came back, but it didn't change anything.

The Summer Is Halfway Over

Water splashing around my knees while I walk in the coarse white sand. The sunlight and the river sparkle like filthy diamonds while the river passes all the places it knew, way back when. Like mouths full of salt water swimming over the oysters that lived here before the sand turned black with oil.
Emily is laughing reading this, she knows the cycles of time so much better than I do. She offers me a piece of watermelon on a skewer along with sweet peppers and home grown tomatoes. It tastes SO good!

Three years later on, and the river is still running down deep, where we can't see it. Put your head down under the water and hear it rush in your ears. Your hands are so cold, in the ugly river. You keep thinking that if you could only grab the pool ladder and climb out, the air would chill your body for just a minute in the autumn sun, and then you could run to your motel room and sleep. You forgot about the memories that come with that, didn't you? The feel of the cold wet rocks under your sandals, the slip of leather on granite under the cold water. The grit of the sand under your feet, calling out like a sentry on Governor's Island while the tide kisses your ankles, your knees. Oars break the water, Walt Whitman is laughing in the sun.

September

The rocks are slipping
under the water, the tide
touches nobody.