picture a naked womanembraced ferociouslyas a brilliant universe:youmake sky flower,caramel voice cool,wild rhythms throbbingchampagne(magnet poem)

For sixty years A/C was not my way.There may have beena few days when I would have cranked it up each year.Since then A/C has become my daily summer friend. Every day blazes eighty-fivein supposed-to-be coolMichigan. I like fake cool,but it’s an ice-gilt prisonthat lulls me in its comfort.

Two days after the big rain,I walked to the mailbox.I spied a small, very dry,lost toad in the middle ofthe road. Early enough for dewto still speckle tall grassalong the ditch, I nabbedher and walked her back.Opening my palm, mid-stoop,she leapt and landed in wet. One less sufferingcreature in the world. A saved toad as…