July @ Nite

No one understood why I hated  summer so much even me, I did not fully understand it. Was it the hot weather that left me feeling sticky and disgusting;  or the skimpy dresses that all the other girls seemed to look so good in or the short shorts or the vest tops that showed off their flawless figures, illuminated by the 30 degree heat?  Was it the summer parties where the drinking took place where the kissing took place all drunken mouths  where I found my best friend kissing someone I loved Later; her apologies ringing in my ears? Was it the unexplained loneliness; I discovered in  forgetting people; seeing each other again after a year,  realising that everything had changed? Or, was it the exclamations of  “But summer is the best season of the year!” And the inability  to explain why I dreaded June, July, August Why I felt this awful sadness  whenever quiet, gentle Spring turned into a 90 day festival from  which I felt so excluded.  I have lived through 19 summers  and each one has been different Each one filled with new, more  complex emotions And I suppose I should not hate summer and I suppose… I don’t It just fills me with a deep, guttural sadness and I can’t quite explain why.

How lucky I am to be missed by those who have run out of ways to hold me? & isn’t that what I always wanted? To keep something perfect long enough for everyone to notice when I’m gone.

“Ah, gentle drivers gliding through summer’s black nights, what frolics, what twists of lust.”

“In nightwater, I didn’t have to feel what people are supposed to feel. There is a glooming peace there. At the end of the rapids, there is a still. In water, like in books, you can leave your life.”