SPECTRUM summertime

Indian Summer   We’d fly Pan Am 24 hours later, we traversed the International Dateline Landed in the Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi My Mom and my siblings exhausted after the flight  Walked in a serpentine line to get our passport and visa stamped  My sister and I were watching our unruly 4-year-old brother and 1-year-old baby sister  When it was our turn to get our visas stamped, the government official stopped us They called in the police The Sikh customs officer came over to us and whispered, “You should have stood in my line. I would have let you go” We did not know what was going on   They ransacked all our suitcases  Diapers, clothing, maxi pads, underwear all thrown out for everyone to see My Mom dropped all her gold coins in my sister’s baby milk bottle They held my Mom hostage for the night while she sent us kids home with her brother, my Mamma ji. I sobbed all night for my mother’s safety. I knew she could have been raped   But my Mom, a fierce Sardarni, th

The Summer of Johnny Wake up each morning--what day is it? It didn't matter--one week left of Mr. Taylor's summer biology class, and the days after would be like a month of Saturdays Velvet voiced Johnny Mathis performing in concert at The Greek three 15-year old teens are going Sandy, Cin, and me--none of us drivers yet In heels and stockings, sleeveless flirty  outfits, our straightened hair in defiance of moisture that might alter our dressed-up look, but not spoil our excitement--we love Johnny We ride in the backseat behind the heads  of reluctant, concerned, licensed parents-- Sandy's---eyes seemingly in the back of her mother's head         Are we being watched? Dropped off at the box office, smiles overtake our faces as we watch them drive away to adult pursuits--we become the adults, saunter to the window to buy tickets then watch as the window comes down in our faces--SOLD OUT instantly we are children again inexperienced fawns staring at a locked gate "W

No AC Moisture gathers on my forehead Forming droplets Dripping past my eyebrows Sometime winning the race  To the lip finish line Seated at my computer Sweat beads trickle down my spine They end their race trapped at my waist. Productiveness of cool early morning hours Gives way to a long siesta time Triple digit daze Melts my enthusiasm Fans, water, but no AC Kauai Warm clear summer sunshine This tropical palm tree day My mind far from civilization My body ten miles from The tourist town of Lihue I crack open a coconut To suck its juicy contents A collection of conch shells To decorate my island hut Living alone with the papayas Mangoes, and guava Pineapple for breakfast Mahi Mahi for lunch And I settle down On the heated moist sand To watch the sunset  With a bottle of Primo Beer San Sebastian Gloomy day at Bay of La Concha promenade Heavy clouds threaten Rain will make its appearance in an eye blink No one in the water on this summer’s day Tourists in tapas bars Content to eat not

They all ask me “why can’t you just be happy?”  Because I don’t know what happiness is —  I don’t know how to hold it like a newborn babe  without the fear of all the ways I will disappoint as a parent I don’t know how to taste it like fresh fruit in summer  without knowing when it’s gone, it’s just gone no other fruit will taste the same I don’t know how to wrap myself in it like a new lover’s embrace without thinking about how many others have felt this warmth – I’m no one special I don’t know how to breathe it into me like the scent of fresh cut flowers  without realizing that each petal will wither and die, to be tossed in the trash  I don’t know how to look at it as butterfly wings flittering by  without contemplating how fleeting a life is lived and morphs into death I don’t know how to drink it in like a glass of Screaming Eagle Cabernet   without tasting tannins of sediment that tell me who I am I don’t know how to speak a language I never

To Summer Long: Love Long I was just reminded that summer to others is winter because the world is off kilter slanted You always secretly wanted winter to be long Pity dear pity that you could never admit your thirst for virginal blood Instead you lapped your way south and stayed there out of habit My compass was true north but alas Love was no match for our sorry widening gyre hackneyed and intoxicated I could only hide in the  Light to avoid going gentle into that good night Now urgent to short I sing myself electric

This Summer This summer flowers are still glorious Birds continue to sing gleefully But I won’t sing along  The heat is not to be blamed  It’s the air stifled by fear The sun scorches land as usual It is not of its concern What happens on Earth More locusts swarm across continents Least of their care is  The human disaster Time still inches forward It won’t speed up  To bring our badly needed solution Greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise Heat waves again may break the record Different types of extreme weather lines up Horrify us more than ever Fights in the world still get heated  Shouts spew spite and spit viruses The death toll continues to rise We become insensitive to the losses As they turn into numbers Nature does not negotiate Our next summer will be better Only if we come together  To fend off these pandemic threats

Goodbye, and... Goodbye, good friend, it's time for you to go Of making merry we have had our share Our tales we told, our cups did overflow Diverting us while autumn's hours fell bare. Remember on that far fair summer's day I met you on the road and bade you bide? Did I know then how generous your stay Despite my errands I'd have stayed inside. And now drear winter's weeks grow wan and chill Now too my patience and my cellar's store Come short, and though I'll love each visit still Each absence will endear you even more. Nona - the spinner of the thread of life - and her sisters Decima and Morta are the three Fates of Roman and Greek mythology, the controllers of human destiny.  They are sometimes associated with the Temple of Apollo and its oracle at Delphi, which sits on the slopes of Mount Parnassus above the seaside town of Itea.  Nona nods Beneath her careful fingers stiches fly— Delphic geese across a rasa sky — Nona nods, unfurls and smooths  fresh c

A Summer Dream Floating at eighty kilometers per hour along the narrow undulating ribbon that transcends the arid landscape into a gentle sweeping right curve that marks the beginning of the ascent up the soft incline of the south fork of two the mountain ridges that form the arms that create a firmly held hollow in the hourglass shape of Silverwood Lake.   Gliding around a smooth wide bend slowly climbing above the parched desert floor, invigorated by the crispness of the cool alpine air. In this world who could ever ask for more.   Suddenly bursting into my view at the base of the long rocky slope the grandeur of the deep sapphire blue hourglass shape of Silverwood Lake   A precious jewel held in giant arms Sparkling joyfully in early morning light with the sun’s yellow white rays shimmering and dancing playfully on her satin smooth surface   The long white wake of a single boat streaking across her outstretched limbs beckons to me, like the song of a siren, to hasten into her waitin

At the Beach Summer time, long, hot, lazy days. Only nights bring some cool fresh air. Summer time, sun sizzling mostly nude bodies in tiny swimsuits. Little naked children play in the shallows   Only the old ladies sit in the shade under big umbrellas draped with colorful towels.   Children enjoy themselves by pouring water on those who are dry, sleeping in the shade.   It seems all found their way to enjoy summer Only I am missing out.

Boys of Summer “Extra! Extra! Read all about it! Tulle fog closes Highway 99! Extra! Extra!” We had earned our way as top street-peddlers of the town's pillar-post,  Merced Sun-Star and rode to the Hunter's Point District of San Francisco In a red station wagon driven by our manager for a baseball game  Between my beloved Giants and the Milwaukee Braves. As we approached Candlestick Park a kid in the back seat began reading aloud: “Post-game curb lane only.”   “What?” questioned the lot-of-our non-driving-selves.   “Post-game curb lane only.” It held rhythmic beat but no meaning, this: Post-game curb lane only. The contest was classic Hall of Fame—a scoreless pitcher's duel  In which the high-kicking, hard-throwing, right-handed, Dominican dandy, Juan Marichal and the old, sly, lefty, Warren Spahn tamed all batters  Until the bottom of the ninth when Willie Mays took Spahnie deep  With a bullet against the wind that got out of the park in a hurry.  We walked merrily back up

Summer Gloom?  Early morning grey  covers June sky  when my husband and I decide  to take two granddaughters  to visit a closed school they used to attend We notice the property’s  bushes and trees are overgrown likely due to students leaving with hurried  good-byes to loved teachers all because of a pandemic Down the street we spot  a beautiful male peacock  with midnight blue neck A long train of feathers  trails behind him while two  brown females with color green gracing their necks  look for food ahead We follow the birds accompanied by a friendly black cat wearing a red collar We hear a caw from above  and notice atop a roof  positioned like a weather  vane  an older bird is calling  to one hidden in a cluster of trees A granddaughter sees a third  disappear around the corner where we are excited to discover not just two peahens but four peachicks While the male watches  from across the way  one mother and the chicks fly up to the top of a wall  to find safety on a rooftop  Amaze

The Collector by Lucifer Satan De’Ville I am very pleased to meet you, glad you got my invitation let me introduce myself, then I’ll show you my collection I’m a man of many interests, I’ve got wealth and style and taste let us start upon the tour, for there is no time to waste. I live in this giant mansion, I’ve got ninety-seven rooms but I’m lonely here all by myself, and that’s not changing soon I have no wife or children, I don’t even have a dog and who would want to marry me? They say I am a hog… I’ve an antique car collection, ‘though I don’t know how to drive but the chauffeur for my limo is on call from 9 to 5. I’ve got Duesenbergs and Bentleys and Ferraris by the score when I get my bailout check I’ll go out and buy some more!  You could see my art collection but it’s in some big museums I’m so generous that I lend ’em so the common folk can see ‘em but I get a big tax write off so I can hang on to my dough    then I buy some more Picassos, more Monet and more van Gogh!    Yea

Summer It’s shiny  …..for some reason The sky is blue …….but the summer sun is dark  just as my hope; believing the unbelievable,  …………….faking rays of shine just as  ……..dissonant notes forced into an orchestra… …………………..How do I shower ………………….. from darkness dipping my soul?  ……….How do I see ………………the light within me, when my eyes can’t see?  …………………Mirrors don’t  reflect nor picture  …………………………………scenes are unseen…  …………………………………..featureless..  …………………Yet, I  ………………………….appear at midnight  ……………..hunting  …………………for my remains under the moon,  ………………………….seeing clear until ……………………I’m -once again- blinded by  ……………………………..doubts, memories, and illusions..  ………………..Fire in my gut decides the next  ……………………………………victimless hunt to  ………………………………………..find what belongs to me…  …………………………Light goes faint and shadows distort their features..  ………………….shattered, shapeless pieces of the puzzle spread in a mess… 

Fabian From the Miccosukees Fabian from the Miccosukee tribe  pilots  the airboat  through the Everglades taking turns  like a skater in a half pipe Water sprays up sawgrass  & yellow calla lilies  in the vast maze of swampland  Fabian nonchalantly tells stories of alligators, water moccasins, raccoons & wading birds  comfortable with gators,  he circles the boat back to feed snacks  to every alligator  he sees A native of the Everglades,  born on Tear Island, Buffalo Tiger was their tribe’s last traditional chief One with the ecosystem,  Fabian is the Everglades, centered  in the sawgrass prairie,  when our ride ends he says, “welcome to my world.” 

My Summer Tutor Favored the Socratic Method, Interrogated, expected truths Not opinions gathered like moss by bark, Said, perhaps; asked, were there exceptions, Why would you behave this way not another? Never stopped questioning. Often repeated her hero’s aphorism  about an unexamined life not worth living. Promoted dialogues, as she called them, To season arguments at communal Agapes.  Taught me essential questions were urgent, Solutions everyone’s life-time enterprise. In her mind, everything turned personal, Unlike Pre-Socratic philosophers, Those ancient scientists trying to figure out  Natural phenomena, Earth’s sphericity musica universalis, and geometry, Disrobing humanity to itself was her goal. I preferred her to my regular teacher A pince-nez, metal rimmed fellow, A toad croaking a single repetitive song from His uninspired repertoire. We ignored his apathy,  Fantasied about having Socrates puzzling us With questions in the classroom’s market place.  Our conversations about

Summer School He had glossy brown eyes and unruly long hair Adam who sat alone Every day at lunchtime Savored my leftover blueberry muffin Like tiramisu Steak and lobster Adam who is all right somewhere Beyond those grassfields of gone eras two birds lost from the flock we sat by a lake in a world we thought included us

The Summer of Woodstock The first time I traveled by plane was the Christmas of ’68  when Cheryl and I took 9 months old Luke to visit my mother  and stepdad, Jimmy, who he would later call Mo and Po. Luke was born two weeks before Martin Luther King was assassinated, one year from the day he spoke in opposition to the Vietnam War  from the pulpit of the Riverside Church in New York City. In June that year, just when it seemed Robert Kennedy was on  the verge of ending the war in Vietnam after winning the California  Democratic Presidential primary, he was murdered like his brother and the greatest obstacle in the the way of the “Masters of War”  continuing their bloodbath in Southeast Asia was removed Jesus Christ, I wondered! Into what kind of a world has my beautiful boy been born. I did not feel like eating but the next day, I broke my fast  by pigging out on peanut butter spread on crackers. In August we watched on our black and white TV at the 1968  Democratic Convention in Chica