Just like that, it's August. Month of elegy, month of rush, the school year looming, the harvest beckoning, all of the get-me-done-before-winter obligations scratching at the door.

Of course I have an easier slide into the school year than most teachers do. My high school sessions don't get underway until late September; and with no children at home, August is more seasonal memory than actual stress. Still, there's the list of winter needs to check off: firewood, chimney sweep, furnace cleaning, car inspection . . . And there's the sudden flurry of visiting: next weekend's hustle to Vermont, the Chicago kids whirling into town, then my trip to Brooklyn, everything crammed in before my teaching schedule chains me into routine.

And summer is far from over. We'll be back in the high 80s today and tomorrow, which I suppose will mean another bout with the noisy air machine. Already the day is deeply humid, 70 degrees at 5:30 a.m. I'll probably go out and pick beans first thing this morning, before the heat sets in. I've got a dish full of plums to deal with--a future cake to bring along to my writing group tonight. I want to buy tickets for tomorrow night's Sea Dogs game, maybe our last chance to see the young Red Sox phenoms before they start getting called up to the bigs. There's no better way to soak in summer sweetness than to lean back in my seat in a minor-league ballpark, sipping a beer and and staring from field to sky as the evening rolls in.

I didn't get much writing done yesterday, mostly just playing with stanza breaks, but I did read a lot. This morning I'll go out for a walk, and then I'll return to the words and see what happens.

Maybe nothing will happen other than flowers and tomatoes and bees and the two monarch butterflies that have fallen in love with my garden. Which will be good enough.