Picnics in the leafy shade,
mighty hula-hooping,
debates of all things mermaid,
days of just regrouping.
A home-made wishing well,
ground consumed by weeds,
on June the first it rained like hell
and continued for two weeks.
Red admiral kaleidoscopes,
lilies back again,
streamlined swallows swooping low,
big plans for the train.
Cherries getting redder,
cloudless cobalt skies,
self-seeded mountain heather
has further colonised.
Best of ten in basketball,
children rhyming words,
sparrowhawks' high-pitched calls
disperse the other birds.
Racing, chasing tractors
as sun and heat maintain,
encrusted in sun factor
we're on a contrary campaign.
Plastic table dining,
wraps and dips hold sway,
water sprinkler sliding,
there goes the longest day.
Celebration of a decade,
eleven now together,
for better or worse it passed away
not to be remembered.
(This is the second of three Summer poems of 2017. The first is Collecting May and the third is Keeping July).
