Late July, one-hundred-and-one degrees.

Fourteen years old and the sweat trickles down

bodies; rumpled sheets his wife never sees.

The dank sweat, stifling air presses; no sound.

Towering over my body holding

despair and fear, littering ashen dust,

my only teacher; summertime scolding

whispering frangible promises, lust.

Listless and languishing, still stifling gray;

she is a shadow waiting to arrive,

carrying small children, dinner, laying

guilt and blame; an abandoned past, contrived.

The dying sun retreating to dark and stone,

I sink benumbed, tenebrous and alone.