What Mattered in June

What Mattered In June

1.

Can she teach anything when it’s this hot?
The mirror in yoga class competes with itself.
Summer holds nothing back.

2.

Why this mess in all my rooms?
Today, between here and the mountains, there is less smoke.
Sanity: learning to let go of plump philosophies.

3.

Don’t you care there’s chicken shit on your shoes?
When I walk near the junipers, the baby robins snap silent, hide their red-throated hunger.
Hard to practice hope with eyes stitched open.

4.

Will I jump the gun, run off half-cocked, miss the target any less next year than this?
To kill salmonella scrub the melon’s pocked skin with hot water and Dawn.
Don’t be fooled: bargains with the devil have been known to work for a time.

5.

Does it matter when I don’t know the answers?
Every year before mildew and the aphids, the lupine still blooms.
It always costs more than you’d’ve guessed to dig up old ground.