{"id":8272,"date":"2011-08-26T11:11:28","date_gmt":"2011-08-26T15:11:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=8272"},"modified":"2011-08-26T11:11:28","modified_gmt":"2011-08-26T15:11:28","slug":"long-languorous-tomorrows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2011\/08\/long-languorous-tomorrows\/","title":{"rendered":"Long, Languorous Tomorrows"},"content":{"rendered":"

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[Image: “August Morning,” by Tracy, from “August in Ohio<\/a>” at the <\/em>Seasons Flow\u00a0blog]<\/em><\/p>\n

[Below, click Play button to begin <\/em>Summertime (Charlie Parker). While audio is playing, volume control appears at left — a row of little vertical bars. This clip is 2:46 long.]<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

[audio:summertime_charlieparker.mp3|titles=’Summertime’|artists=Charlie Parker]<\/div>\n

From whiskey river<\/em>:<\/p>\n

Late August<\/strong><\/p>\n

Let me enjoy
\nthis late-summer day of my heart
\nwhile the leaves are still green
\nand I won’t look so close
\nas to see that first tint
\nof pale yellow slowly creep in.
\nI will cease endless running
\nand then look to the sky
\nand ask the sun to embrace me
\nand then hope she won’t tell
\nof tomorrows less long than today
\nLet me spend just this time
\nin the slow-cooling glow
\nof the warm afternoon light
\nand I’d think
\nI will still have the strength
\nfor just one more
\nlast fling of my heart<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Jon Bohrn [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n

…and (italicized portion):<\/p>\n

Directions<\/strong><\/p>\n

You know the brick path in back of the house,
\nthe one you see from the kitchen window,
\nthe one that bends around the far end of the garden
\nwhere all the yellow primroses are?
\nAnd you know how if you leave the path
\nand walk up into the woods you come
\nto a heap of rocks, probably pushed
\ndown during the horrors of the Ice Age,
\nand a grove of tall hemlocks, dark green now
\nagainst the light-brown fallen leaves?
\nAnd farther on, you know
\nthe small footbridge with the broken railing
\nand if you go beyond that you arrive
\nat the bottom of that sheep’s head hill?
\nWell, if you start climbing, and you
\nmight have to grab hold of a sapling
\nwhen the going gets steep,
\nyou will eventually come to a long stone
\nridge with a border of pine trees
\nwhich is as high as you can go
\nand a good enough place to stop.<\/p>\n

The best time is late afternoon
\nwhen the sun strobes through
\nthe columns of trees as you are hiking up,
\nand when you find an agreeable rock
\nto sit on, you will be able to see
\nthe light pouring down into the woods
\nand breaking into the shapes and tones
\nof things and you will hear nothing
\nbut a sprig of birdsong or the leafy
\nfalling of a cone or nut through the trees,
\nand if this is your day you might even
\nspot a hare or feel the wing-beats of geese
\ndriving overhead toward some destination.<\/p>\n

But it is hard to speak of these things<\/em>
\n how the voices of light enter the body<\/em>
\n and begin to recite their stories<\/em>
\n how the earth holds us painfully against<\/em>
\n its breast made of humus and brambles<\/em>
\n how we who will soon be gone regard<\/em>
\n the entities that continue to return<\/em>
\n greener than ever, spring water flowing<\/em>
\n through a meadow and the shadows of clouds<\/em>
\n passing over the hills and the ground<\/em>
\n where we stand in the tremble of thought<\/em>
\n taking the vast outside into ourselves.<\/em><\/p>\n

Still, let me know before you set out.
\nCome knock on my door
\nand I will walk with you as far as the garden
\nwith one hand on your shoulder.
\nI will even watch after you and not turn back
\nto the house until you disappear
\ninto the crowd of maple and ash,
\nheading up toward the hill,
\npiercing the ground with your stick<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Billy Collins [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Not from whiskey river<\/em>:<\/p>\n

Intimate Detail<\/strong><\/p>\n

Late summer, late afternoon, my work
\ninterrupted by bees who claim my tea,
\neven my pen looks flower-good to them.
\nI warn a delivery man that my bees,
\nwho all summer have been tame as cows,
\nnow grow frantic, aggressive, difficult to shoo
\nfrom the house. I blame the second blooms
\ncome out in hot colors, defiant vibrancy—
\nunexpected from cottage cosmos, nicotianna,
\nand bean vine. But those bees know, I\u2019m told
\nby the interested delivery man, they have only
\nso many days to go. He sighs at sweetness untasted.<\/p>\n

Still warm in the day, we inspect the bees.
\nThis kind stranger knows them in intimate detail.
\nHe can name the ones I think of as shopping ladies<\/em>.
\nTheir fur coats ruffed up, yellow packages tucked
\nbeneath their wings, so weighted with their finds
\nthey ascend in slow circles, sometimes drop, while
\nother bees whirl madly, dance the blossoms, ravish
\nbroadly so the whole bed bends and bounces alive.<\/p>\n

He asks if I have kids, I say not yet. He has five,
\nall boys. He calls the honeybees his girls although
\nhe tells me they\u2019re ungendered workers<\/em>
\nwho never produce offspring. Some hour drops,
\nthe bees shut off. In the long, cool slant of sun,
\nspent flowers fold into cups. He asks me if I\u2019ve ever
\nseen a Solitary Bee<\/em> where it sleeps. I say I\u2019ve not.
\nThe nearest bud\u2019s a long-throated peach hollyhock.
\nHe cradles it in his palm, holds it up so I spy
\nthe intimacy of the sleeping bee. Little life safe in a petal,
\nlittle girl, your few furious buzzings as you stir
\nstay with me all winter, remind me of my work undone.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Heid E. Erdrich [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n

…and (complete transcript here<\/a>):<\/p>\n

[Below, click Play button to begin <\/em>Summer Sounds: Dogs Panting. While audio is playing, volume control appears at left — a row of little vertical bars. This clip is 3:42 long.]<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

[audio:summersoundspanting_codrescu.mp3|titles=’Summer Sounds: Dogs Panting’|artists=Andrei Codrescu]<\/div>\n

Sally Marie is becoming a lady of a certain age. She has long, delicate legs and her slight pot belly looks right above all four of them as she keeps pace with her younger, more uncouth and insanely playful new companion, Lula Harp.<\/p>\n

Their styles couldn’t be more different and, thus, they trudge up and down and up again the gravel road through the woods in the 103-degrees heat…\u00a0What they both do on these long expeditions that Laura and I take for our postprandial constitutional is pant.<\/p>\n

…different as they are, they both pant, not halfway through the walk.<\/p>\n

By the end of it, they could be heard panting from a mile off and give off that lovely smell of sweaty, tired dog that is sweet, acrid and smug as if it were some kind of trophy substance.<\/p>\n

Neither one of them turns down the walk, there being treats at the end of it, but the treats are, of course, different. Lady Sally Marie will have only beef rawhides, while carefree Lula is practically a hippy. She’ll gobble apple, grapes, peach and nuts.<\/p>\n

But they pant. They pant like overexerted athletes and they wallow in the glory of their panting slime like Olympic gymnasts. The lady and the tramp are one in panting sisterhood, the sound of summer, all right.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Andrei Codrescu, “Summer Sounds: Panting Dogs” [source<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n

I knew I wanted to use\u00a0an instrumental version of Gershwin’s sweet,\u00a0languorous, and nowhere near long-enough “Summertime<\/a>” (from Porgy and Bess<\/em>) at the top of this week’s post. Picking one rendition, though, proved difficult. Here are a few more favorites (including various vocals):<\/p>\n