13 Ways to Look at Summer

This is in the style of a poem called 13 ways of Looking at a Blackbird by Wallace Stevens

I. The sweat trickling
down and off your chin.

II. Pale skin basking
in the heat

III. Ankles reemerging
after winter hibernation

IV. Toes gleefully dancing
on golden sand

V. The incessent reptition
of ice cream truck melodies

VI. The smell of coconut oil
and burnt skin

VII. Diving into the frigid water
slipping, sliding, falling.

VIII. streets crowded and noisy
small children run wild

IX. never before has a fire hydrent
held such importance

X. Shoulders reappear; eyes disappear

XI. schools lay undisturbed
no children there to scorn them

XII. the trees, so lush and full
cannot block the intense midday sun

XIII. three more months, and all is gone.