A Sonnet for the Dog Days

Dog days bright and clear
Indicate a good year;
But when accompanied by rain,
We hope for better times in vain.
– North American farmers’ proverb

Spring was wet as a wound. The summer
cantered in dry. Sidesaddle. We were just
learning how to ride the old horse. There was
that gaudy procession of locusts beyond the
fence. It was that same sick heat that dried out
those lazy pharaohs in their tombs. You’d taken
the year’s bad luck from your arm and buried
it in the backyard. It was a shallow grave. And
when the earth above it cracked, you were still
dogged to learn how to ride. The ripe
sick-sweet rot clung even to your hair. Some
-where much farther South, this was the prelude
to an annual flood. The ossuaries got full very
quickly. We’d hoped for better times in vain.