Mid-Summer Evening

It's half past July boys and girls and real summer has finally come to Streeterville. It's 85 degrees outside and humid as all get out. There is not a cloud in the sky, save a few scattered wispy cirrus up around the stratosphere. The boats are boating on a lake of deep blue against a backdrop of pale blue sky. Indiana and its last few steel mills and its blossoming crop of casinos is clearly visible to the south and east. It's the kind of mid-summer evening when people with porches sit on them and say hello to the neighborhood when it goes by. It's the kind of evening when beer gardens make their serious cash. It's the kind of warm summer evening when young men search diligently for young women to kiss (and vice versa I would assume.).

Mid-Summer Evening

Young men on bikes
Young women in pink
Some of them fat
Some of them sleek

Old men in running shoes
Mothers on skates
Children try keeping up
But Mom turns and waits

Volleyball tournaments
Dogs chasing balls
Jugglers with juggling clubs
That never do fall

Girls in bikinis
Guys with tattoos
A beach filled with tanners
A bar filled with booze

Lake full of sailboats
Power yachts and crew
A barge full of cargo
And cruise ships, a few

Yellow slanting sunlight
And shadows that grow
As day becomes evening
In a never ending flow

R.D. Ray
7-15-09

This has been a bit of a departure from the normal format of Views, but some days the muse strikes your fancy and your fancy strikes the muse right back. Go out and do something outdoors. The cold will return all too soon. The days will grow shorter and Daylight Saving Time will end. There is time enough to consider the confirmation of Ms. Sotomayor, the state of the economy (The Dow Jones jumped 300 points today.), and our country's effort to provide healthcare for all. Happy Mid-summer.