From: "Love T.K.O."

Away From it All

To lie in the sun and forget.
Or to plunge head-first into a brimming pool
and force the bubbles out from under you.
Love the coolness on your neck and on your feet
and as you surface
gasping lungsful of soft air,
kick gently to part the water and drift off
to a happier world, where
the sound is children giddily
volleying the sun like a beach-ball
between two teams of pretty teenagers
and you turn and say - yes
this year is a few degrees warmer than last.
And gaze in wonder how the gliders that spiral
way above your head can still float
in this flawless light.

And from the height of the highest slide
you take in everything beneath you -
the sky, the earth, the water -
and make the details work for you.
The strolling attendants are for your safety.
That business with the swimming cap
was for the cleanliness at your convenience.
The polystyrene cartons are not ugly but hygienic.
And you notice how the footsteps
climbing toward you up the aluminium ladder
coincide with the regimen of the pool-side clock
and you turn and say - no
no, things could not be better -
because the tumbling waterfall
could be the glass beads
your daughter won in the lucky dip
and you wave to her in the pool,
gamely struggling to hold her head above the water
and swimming for dear life.

And you see the world is big enough
to take care of itself. Back down
you arch your back against the earth
and the afternoon sun peeks
through the slits of your eyes and you moan
blissfully, as if your wife and the trees fanning you
and this summer fortnight
were a meal you should take time to digest.
Or as though the blueness of the sky
were the blueness of the water
and those clouds were the foot-prints
in the sand of a beach
that you alone are walking, far away,
and never knowing that the planet you walk on is dying.
But you wake slowly to the birds
making roost in the club-house eaves
and you say to yourself - no
this must never end.