…July in the summer garden : the plants that seemed

in May so fresh ( like young girls standing discrete…

pristine in their green uniform of promise )

now throw off all restraint    No more apartness

they declare    no space between    They twine and

drape and lean against each other    giddy…

display their petticoat parts     Each night daylilies

paint new bright faces     while among them thin

crocosmias sprawl    their many arms ‘round all…

red mouths open  …for bees   …for birds  …oh

delirious fecundity and fertile chaos!

But see there the sturdy sunflower fellow that

quietly parts the flash girls and grows tall?  He

belongs to August   September  …the coming fall