Caliente, Caliente

For once the weather makes me feel faint, but not shrinking. A rusted gray VW Thing pulls up across the street and I want to go to Africa. I wish for secret water to dive into and I dream of South America.

This will be the summer of old heat: cartographic expeditions to the swimming-holes of my youth—lock-back pocketknife, overalls over swimsuit, plastic bag for tadpoles, lunch. We were Admiral Byrd, we were Captain Cook. We came, we saw, swam, stripped, napped, ate. Chainsaws in the distance. Always crows.

Journey to the heart of light: dappled, breezy. Boys on dirt-bikes. Girls on horseback. Coyote follows. Once a bear: spooked, breakneck—dumped in straw, winded, wild-eyed as horses, as cattle when the jig is up.

Once nearly naked in moonlight. Not vulgar—mythic. Nothing like an evening playing centaur to make you live the rest of your life invincible.