The sun beats,
splits your skin.
Underneath
you’re heated till ductile;
you yield to the day.

The day is bloodhot.
A fish in a fist; you feel it
like a clot
in summer’s vein.
It drums the city dry.

You stay
in sungripped rooms
too small to compete.
Too soft with sweat,
you splinter and dash.

You happily waste the day.
Now nothing
has the energy
to raise itself
far off the ground.