Slow Cinnamon Summer

I bask in sun-long days,

skin sizzling, shimmering with sweat,

wearing shields made of lotions

that smell like distant memories of the tropics,

salt, surf, and fruity drinks.

I drink in the humidity

as if the air could hydrate my DNA,

as if we could become one

so I could live in the stickiness forever,

fully becoming the inner goo,

of a toasted mallow.

Warm afternoon rain pours into puddles.

My toes twirl through the petrichor,

fingers swirling the oils and geosmin

through the lingering mist,

dancing with the raw scent of the Earth.

I think this is what it must have smelled like,

in the beginning.

A fire crackles in the evening,

orange flames playing peek-a-boo with the fading sun.

I lounge in the lingering warmth,

embracing the sweetness,

the Ceylon comfort that only high season can bring