The green in the forest is so deep I feel I can walk two feet into it and disappear. The rhododendrons are faded and a few fireweed are starting to bloom. The rain is warm. The storms that blow through have no teeth and show no willingness to stay. People who call Sitka their spiritual home but who cannot take the winter slink back into town and show up in the cafes in their white shirts and winter tans, shaking hands and talking about the berry crops hoping we won't notice they've been gone. The sunsets linger for hours. The drunks sleep in the bushes near the harbor and some of them have berry stains on their lips. The apple trees have rough leaves covering their limbs and the leaves hold pearls of water in the early morning, when the fog lingers and Thrushes sing back in the woods. Fat Robins eat worms on the library lawn. The mailman wears shorts. Some sailboats will unfurl a colorful spinnaker for a downwind run, and the trollers are vying for spots up on the grid. There are tough looking women with tattoos and tank tops walking on the docks. who look too thin to be deck hands, and they smoke cigarettes like they just learned how, and some of their men are just getting out of jail. Small bears are getting into garbage cans on the edge of town, and out at the gun range a couple of guys are sighting in their rifles. The air is warm, even though the clouds are low, and anytime of day or night there could be a few drops of rain. College kids are home and looking for jobs. Some are eating ice-cream on the corner and some are scratching their mosquito bites. The humming birds are fighting beside the feeders and the lazy bees crowd the berry bushes. You are beautiful while walking slowly from the house to the car, and we drive carefully through the construction to work and back home again, where we make dinner and go to bed so we can sleep in each others arms with the windows open to the bay where the gulls wheel over the islands of our sweet, brief summer dreams.
jhs... Sitka, Ak
