Sun Ghetto (2004)

In the ghetto of the sun
we age into rough skins,
for a lifetime of arousals
weds to a ring of fire.
In the Daytona TJ Maxx
princes and paupers searched
for threads of that ire,
seeking to ferry it far
into the dream waters
of infinite night. Phat boyz
with tattooes in faux
hip hop hats weave
trails of hot jive
everywhere but home,
exactly where the Venus
of summer yearning
bids them come.
On the other side of
the store the gals
try to fit into brilliance
despite child after child
the sun hid inside them
while they dazzled
the sands. Inside the store
it’s cool and soft-lit,
a bower of new
clothes over which the
sun at full throttle
levels all with its scythe.
There is no aging here
in the sun’s archipelago,
only heat which fans
to a lesser or greater roar
something we’ll never
hold in our hands.
We’re no different here,
my wife looking for
pants to fit a frame
thinned by worry, me
for shorts and shirts
more generous to my girth
We too are regents of
a summer that we are
old enough sailors in,
sealing our house tight
with a/c, slathering thick
the SPF40 before
heading out to pull
weeds in the garden.
Over us the sun makes
its high thrall while
we try to make it matter
less if at all -- to love
the endearing enduring
which cares to make a bed
big enough to catch the
wheeled ball and hold
it in our arms as we sleep
less it drag us under
where all sunburners
blight the ur-burbs of death:
A glittering trailer parked
on the shores of a thong,
a blazing isthmus
cramming mouths with
a music that can never end,
cannot quench, cannot arise
since the ghetto of summer
never favors or falls.