Pool Daze

Hour One:
Tired and groggy we wake
to the shore of the shallow
end, another orange morning
with the sun fresh
and dripping.

Hour Two:
Arms and back sporting
a deep, healthy tan
draped in a violent red
shirt that spells,
"Don't fuck with me"
in GUARD letters
across the back.

You will listen to us
just by the way we sit.
But our ears are flooded
with the squealing,
the splashing,
the jumping,
and the smiling
of all these half-naked children.
Oh, how the young lives squirm
so freely.

Hour Three:
We leave the shade
to bake in the sun.
Sweat drips quick
into the trunks
salting the belly.
Get so high,
it seems like
we're all drowning.
Even out here.

We'll leave
all the thinking
for the future.
Now, only amazed
at all the hair,
piss, spit, and ridiculous
sorts of trash
clogging the gutters.

Hour Four:
Each day we relearn
how to numb the mind
with chlorine and hours
many,
many,
hours.

Again we learn,
not by device, nor by scolding
can you ever prevent
a mexican teenager
from canon-balling.

We know Diego,
We know Luis,
We know Marcia
and all 18 of her cousins,
how they love to scream
and look back
after each illegal dive.

We have let it slide so many times
our eyes begin to close.
The babies in diapers,
the mothers in slippers,
prepubescence
in it's most awkward form
is humping the metal handrail
ten feet away.

Hour Five:
Maybe a chuckle or two
will escape when we watch
the eleven-year-old boys
discovering the bubble jets
and pleasuring their genitals
with high-pitched yelps
of guilty delight.

Or the young family,
with their young baby
so kind, so innocent,
giving me hope
for the future,
but
it is all shattered
by another obnoxious
and watery explosion from
Luis' ass.

Hour Six:
Praying for rain
praying for a friend,
using the phone as the only
key to the world outside
and those epic moments
of surprise with the relief
of a companion's visit
and the treat of pizza,
conversation, music,
and the royal highness.
It all comes together
so incredibly
perfect.

Hour Seven:
Netting up the days'
debris, mesmerized
by the color of the water
the way the sun hits
the surface and how it shines,
lazily and bright
Makes me wonder
whether it is even real
at all.

Hour Eight:
Grueling by the edge,
kicking out the kids,
nodding to parents,
waving to their babies,
counting each second
on the stubborn clock,
who always refuses to move.

The day is done.
The sun leaves it's glow
on the deck, it's heat on
the skin.
Locking up, closing down,
walking away from a summer
that still melts in the trees
and into the pavement.

In Honor of:
A year that has been burnt
into the memories of the men
with the red shirts.