The summer came roaring into town like a freight train, hot noise accompanied by a great swirling wind, some infernal furnace blasting the edges of rose petals and perfuming the air. The sky is wide and high up there blue and I can feel the sun's heat baking the grass, the sidewalk, my skin, turning tool handles hard and brittle, quickening the earth. Sun worshippers corn and tomatoes and cucumbers and beans, still small from the cold rains now sing their new foliage song, some whispery hiss of happiness as they grow. In the tall catalpa tree above me I hear the first creaking clicks of a cicada, signifying that ninety-degree Fahrenheit point. The heat begs for iced tea and sprinklers and the intonations of windchimes.

Enjoy the weekend.