Cicadas are almost deafening
And you can’t listen to the cicadas without lemonade.
My childhood footsteps run down through the grass and the trees.
They track mud through the house persistently,
As if I needed to retrace those steps one day.
I will miss this heat:
The way it drenches you,
Melts you to the point where you only want to
Lie there in the grass and surrender to it.
The asphalt burns into my skin,
Blistering and blackening the soles of my feet by the end of every day
Because I’m too stubborn to put on a pair of shoes.
(Stubborn, but mostly eager to prove I’m tougher than they think.)
I will miss that too,
The feeling of charred calluses and tender soles
Nursed in icy bathwater each night by callused and tender hands.
I will miss the way dusk fades into dark
And how it temporarily blinds you,
How if you’re not paying attention, night sneaks up on you
And scares you half to death once you bother to look out the window.
I will miss the crows,
Showing up at the end of every July
My own personal usher, leading me into autumn.
I could never forget running to the beat of marching band rehearsals,
Kicking up rubber and shaking off sweat,
Hating every minute of it, but loving it just the same,
And living for the sound of the starting gun.
And I will always wish I could carry it all around with me,
The screaming heat,
The scars and the way the crows
Flick their wings at you as if you’re in their way.
But I want more than that.
I want to escape.
I want new heat, and new dusks,
Just to remind myself
That I had it good,
But that it can always get better.
