The summer that the world turned thirteen
I was on my Grandpa's farm;
I was all over it, and it on me.
Rough-coated seeds from tall blown grass
were in my hair, down my t-shirt,
between my toes -
with enough mud and dust for them to sprout in.
Long brown hairs were caught,
on apple-laden branches,
on fallen moss-covered logs,
on the boards of the abandoned hayloft.

One July morning I woke before all sound.
Warm, sweet air lay silent on my skin
as I walked from the house all the way up the hill
to where the fields ended and the woods reclaimed the earth.

The fresh cotton of my dress bunched in my hands.
As I lifted it the air leaped up to lick my skin.
Bare feet straddled in the fine warm dust
I felt the air work soft fingers over my belly,
over my hips and thighs,
through the curling hair between my legs.

Then I lifted the dress from my shoulders
and tossed it away on the ground.

With my arms held wide I stood
nothing between me and my summer.
I had it all: leaf-shadows stroked my breasts,
and the air that warmed my shoulders
felt cool on my nipples,
they tightened.
The fingers of the breeze were soft
stroking the warm pink lips-within-lips
I did not have a name for yet.
The scent of birch and grass and dust
and the pines and blackberries
and thistles and salal
soaked into my skin,
the skin of my lips and my breasts,
my belly and soft inner thighs,
the hair under my arms and the hair between my legs,
and sank deep, deep into the ever-darker-pink canyon
that I still had never touched,
that summer touched for me
that dawn.

I had it all, that morning
Summer had me.



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