HEAT WAVE

Sweat bristles on the skin in a moist film strip,

Runs, transparent and beaded, unreeled,

Light traces out the edge of the dampened hairline,

The shape of the forehead

Dripping wet into the eyes, where salt burns

And clouds the scene.

A heat wave blisters the earth’s surface,

Invades airspace first,

Subdues the things I try to see second,

Traps them all, like animals caged before slaughter,

Like chickens crated and stacked on a flat-bed truck,

Their feathers scattered along a buckled road.

Leaves wilt, water draws back from the pond’s edge,

Mud hardens and cracks,

Trees stare out from the shade of

Their parched green skins and shudder in a slight breeze

That drives in the heat dome and slams shut an unknowable door

That takes away the draft and stifles sound.

Raccoons cool their nursing bellies in a bird bath;

Sun bleach overexposes everything it touches;

Slowly wicks away water and burns yellow and brown;

Heat surfs down to earth, casts a flood light,

Marbles the forest floor with sun spots that grow as

The living curl up, the hot liquid air runs

Like melted wax down a candle where nothing can fly

So close to the sun.

© cmheuer, 2013