roses and summer

The roses I brought home from work last Saturday are dying.  I should toss them out, I know.  Their petals litter my entryway and leave sticky dark shadows on my olive green credenza.  Every time I grip the borrowed glass vase with intention to discard them, I'm struck by a wall of fragrance.  Well, not fragrance, exactly.  Gone is the bouquet of dust and lemon that sighed from their proud heads upon arrival to my house.  Gone - and as the roses bow their faces, they exhale a sour dying breath, disrupting my every coming and going.

The truth is that I like this smell, it's obscenity.  I like the way they look, weeping color and life.

Three months ago, summer hit the South like a visiting in-law - rudely, but with fair warning.  In summers past, I had a habit of shutting off.  I would forego swimming holes and barbecues and bide my time until autumn rose from the ashes of summer's heat.  I would sing autumns praises in unison with the masses and thank God that the devil's season was through.  How many days have I lost with this kind of thinking?

As a girl, I don't remember having hard opinions on which season was the best.  Every season grew wildly into the next and each held surprises and banner days.  When did I learn to hate the life-giving sun when he burns fiercest, or the slate-cleaning wind when he blows coldest?  When did I forget how to be?

It's the end of August.  The temperature is dropping off as leisurely as the drawl on my father's tongue.  I sit out on the stoop most days after work and get reacquainted with this middle season that I used to know as a girl but have lost contact with over the years.  All over, folks are heralding fall.  As much as I want to dream candy corn dreams with the rest, I'm trying so hard to redeem the lost days of my adolescence.

Summer is dying, just like my roses.  I'm listening to her swan song eagerly, hoping she feels my apology.  I'm sorry I wasn't present, I'm sorry that I missed so much.  But the beauty clings on like pink on a rose.  Fleeting, immortal.