Poolside at World’s Gym

Dothan, Al. 6/19/99

A flower garden beside a pond;

breasts and bottoms

of yellow and green and hot pink;

tan, taut limbs, bronze bodies

lie prostate with arms overhead

in supplication and worship

to a sun that is either beneficent or unforgiving

depending upon your skin tone.

This is hedonism at its best.

Work and sweat to sculpt the body

then lie and bake and sweat to color it.

Both conditions time and effort intensive,

both conditions temporary.

And here the poet/judge,

the ostensibly objective observer,

taking time out from the sun to write this down

while marking time before my own workout.

Obsession is its own reward;

provides focus and structure and purpose.

Transitory goals are goals nonetheless;

when busy painting the house

what’s inside is forgotten;

at least for a while. 

And just when I intellectualize the motivation,

the mindlessness of it all,

out trots a true believer

with a bottle of water and a towel,

and I stop pontificating long enough

to surreptitiously enjoy the unveiling

as bikini bottom wriggles out of tight cut-offs.

Well, we can’t all be Sandburg or Shakespeare,

pontificating upon broad-shouldered cities

or Roses by other names.

Lacking the necessary depth,

some of us must just resign ourselves

to thinking wide.