On a night
like tonight
I would be
lying back on the roof
in the cool breeze
staring at the stars
or
hiking up the hill alone
in the mostly dark
hearing the frogs ribbit by the water and
the owls hoot in the rustling trees,
listening closely
for other calming night sounds,
doing everything I could
not to think about snakes –
which I can’t not
think about
now.
I wouldn’t be
sitting inside
behind closed windows
hiding
from the dense
suffocating heat,
trying to
think
beyond the thick haze.
I would already be
thinking lucidly
crisply
smoothly
without having
to try.