August

Named for an emperor, these days have a round, plump, dry summer taste in the mouth. Sun shifts its course more clearly overhead, bearing down with its arc. I note our tendergreen snap beans crane their necks into it, into the arc of the sun, into the emperor days. In the next room, ukelele strums, words with half our alphabet missing, a voice reaching through the walls with stories of Hualalai, Kawaihae, Kona, wind, flowers and sweethearts. Soon other sounds come in from New York. They've been up a while. The world feels like a boxing match to them. The crowd cheers and boos for this cause or that cause, truth vs evil, weighing in at 800 million barrels of crude, it's slick, it's bad for jobs, great for the military, Pakistan Taliban Floodwaters Islam, not to mention cohabitating politicos in Australia explaining what goes on behind closed doors, privacy no longer personal property, take Niger they're too hungry and beat up to care, somebody's down, somebody's up, the ref's on his knees, slapping the canvas with his left hand while the talking heads discuss how it's going to go, how it went last time, how the statistics managed to leak out before the truth had a chance, how the national discussion revolves around disclosure...then all that is muted, the wind comes in, the ukelele rings out, the walls feel more how shall I say? calm. Time for breakfast on this third day of August.