To Em, at the beginning of her 12th summer

I sometimes write poetry for my children. I like to share my own memories with them when it fits.
To Em, At the Beginning of Her Twelfth Summer
Eyes opening at about 11
to shouts coming from somewhere
about feeding dogs and cleaning rooms and cars
and informing me that
“If you think you’re going to sleep
until 11 everyday this summer, you’ve got
another thing coming.”

And dazed, I’m thinking about
‘things,’ and how mostly it isn’t
bad if another one comes anyway…
So, after rolling out from under sheets
that miraculously cooled overnight
(and checking to see if that slugofasister
has beat me out of bed (damn!)

I’m up and processing the ‘another thing coming’ thought
with hot buttered toast and milk and tea
by mentally creating my Manifesto For Summer that dictates
All Another Things That Come Shall Be Welcomed and Treated Hospitably
and that although some say there should be laws
against grass so green and skies so blue and
bikes that fly down hills and soar across never-ending straight-aways,
such laws shall be dis (or is that un?) allowed – except
in the case of 'another things' that try to keep a twelve-year old
from being a twelve-year old.

Somehow, then, heat melts the morning and
I’m back from whatever and I’m allowing
baked beans and home-made bread sloshed
with butter to bolster my brain and my body
into an afternoon
of bouncing balls against that side
of the house that never did have a window
(Thank God!)
and creating a rhythm that codes
into a night
of locusts-in-love and lightning bugs
and laughing until it was so late
I didn’t know
I didn’t care
until I heard those shouts again threatening
another thing coming at about 11
next morning.