snip, snip, gather them in

last week.....

the first day of summer. ninety degrees and steamy at eleven o'clock in the morning. not a typical maine day, no, not at all. joe cupo on channel 6 predicts three more days of this. i stand in the garden, glance around, shake my head. in addition to the heat, there's something else that's not quite right, something else that's off.

silence. dead silence. not a chirp, not a song, no buzzing of bees or dragonflies or the low hum of an incoming hummingbird over my head, no wind, only the faint burble of the little stream as it meekly shushes and tumbles, seeking its way through the forest.

i stare at them. they are starting to appear defeated, heads drooping low. i know if i don't take some action many of the splendid buds won't bloom properly, and those that do won't last. they will be seared and cooked right on their own stems until they're well done and finished. i mutter to myself this isn't good, not good at all.

it's too much for them. (it's too much for me. i don't know how i would deal with the heat if i lived in the south. james and megan won't see me visiting them in texas in the summer, that's for sure.) they will wilt, wither, waste away, if left alone to fend for themselves against the heat wave that's overpowering everything, myself included. but there's one thing i can do to save them—get the scissors and start cutting.

we don't get a lot of oppressive days like this along the southern maine coast—maybe 3 or 4 of them a year—and by oppressive i mean where there is no reprieve from the heat, no afternoon sea breeze, the humidity staying high and the temperature barely dipping and there's nothing to help air out the house and cool it down in preparation for yet another day of heat. we used to tough it out when there wasn't a breeze—we didn't even have an air conditioner in the bedroom until two years ago—but we've become wimpy. no, not we, me. i'm the wimpy one; ed doesn't mind the heat.

i grab an old pair of slightly rusty scissors i use for the garden out of a terra cotta pot on the porch where i also keep the garden trowels and some string. snip, snip, gather them in before they fall to ruin. i whisper to them, to myself, in reassuring tones, fill the basket, carry them into the cool house and put them in fresh water away from the sun. i have closed the shades and curtains—it is as cool and dark as a crypt. i don't like it; i would much rather be able to leave the shades open and live in the light.

the silky, multi-layered white flowers, with bits of deep pink hidden like little surprises inside their frilly ruffles, are my favorites. they smell particularly sweet—they make the whole room smell sweet. i don't remember its name, but that plant is my most prolific. i am having some trouble with the raspberry/fuchsia/magenta/rose ones—what color are they exactly? i get confused, almost color-blinded by all the names—way too many shades of pink—which are bush-like and exhibit fine green leaves but not many blooms. do they need more manure? more mulch? more love?

the name—peony. i like saying it even if it's just in my head.

what do meteorologists know. the next day a cold front from the north lands on our doorstep and brings with it some clouds and a breeze, and much lower humidity and temperatures. comfortable. shades up, windows open. (we are, as they say, on the leading edge of the front. just 25 miles south of here, and a few miles to the west, it's still sweltering.) my snipping was completely unnecessary; i could have left the peonies alone. but never mind—they keep me company indoors instead, where i see them both night and day.

this week.....

the inevitable falling of petals, the bottommost ones heart-shaped and crumpled and lying in a heap.

lazy

as i regard the shore from my place on the sand
i smell air rank with humidity
like a steam iron set on high
it blasts its way down my neck, arms, legs
attacks my clothes my helpless skin weak limp
as the heat presses against me to flatten wrinkled thoughts
to skewer flesh against flesh
melting, sticking, succeeding.

as i regard a host of feelings fanning out in my mind
i eat an apple swallowing granny smith
after a few chews.
i try to read franzen's the corrections but fail
my head lazy, stupid with heat
yet rising through this brain haze a realization:
the only correction anyone needs
is one that will lift up
the burden of this oppressive air.

as i regard my legs submerged in waves
baptized in deep ocean coolness i remain
startled by headlines, struck by pictures of crowds suffering
the heat burning in big cities, in countless unknown towns
i can't see across this summer land.
they wait ready to surrender to merciful fountains, sprinklers
a christening rain falling like manna saving thousands
washing away their sweat and my blindness
offering one small benediction at a time.

sizzlewave

on a night like this, when a heat wave arrives, nothing else to do but turn off the big lights and sit in semi darkness on the porch, the painful intensity of normal lighting banished in order to try and fool our brains into at least thinking we feel a bit cooler.

the dogs stretch out motionless on the wooden floor, too hot to lie on their beds, wag their tails, lick our hands, nudge our arms or nuzzle us with their noses—poor things—as the heat closes over our heads and seems to suck away our oxygen supply. dogs and humans remain still, almost smothered in a state like catatonia, the heat forcing us into dormancy, slowly breathing in and out, an effort which, fortunately, is involuntary or else we might opt to cease doing it at all.

we reluctantly leave our seats to peer inside the refrigerator and the freezer, hopeful that cold beers or a splash of ice cubes in lemonade, iced tea or a mixture of both (thank you arnold palmer), will offer some relief. we place a bucket of water out for the dogs, but they can barely be bothered to open their eyes, let alone their mouths, to look at what we're doing.

we humans on the porch are such wimps, unable to take the heat. our anglo-saxon northern european roots hide deep within our cells and tonight they cry out and expose us for what we are. our body's ancient programming is searching for a way to cool-off, a gene pool's primal urge for self-preservation.

in the middle of the heat wave three of my husband's friends from new jersey roar up the driveway on harley's, having completed their road trip to prince edward island. we welcome them to our "bed and breakfast." we were going to fire up the barbecue grill, but the heat forces us to abandon that plan and escape indoors to gritty's air-conditioned pub for dinner.

relief.

later in the evening, back on the porch again, the night cools down into the 70's. by 11 o'clock our dna finally relaxes and feels at home again in our bodies.