we swam for joy
all summer long

lived in the lake
contesting dive rank

who had the wettest

cannon ball
broadest swan
sharpest jack

the underwater distance competition!
you sink like a stone
shovel your feet into the muck

crank like a panzer through honey
eighty seconds later
pop up way out there

our twelve year old bodies
cavorted slithered swam
through rising storms and setting suns

summer put there for us to inhale
then pound on one another like gorillas

suddenly it was back-to-school
while we were learning to borrow a one
our minnow natures died