Heavenly Bodies

Summer, so newly arrived, so late we thought we'd not see it until 2012, lingers gloriously. Few are the nights in Seattle when you can sit at the lake's edge after dark and not shiver.

Last night was such a night, and we sat with our feet in sand, the moon one day shy of full. A dull roar from traffic on the Evergreen Point Bridge. Curious -- and we talked about this -- that in daylight the roar is so less evident. Is it because in the dark there are so many fewer stimuli to occupy the brain that the auditory intensifies, grows more immediate?

Swimmers in the dark periodically popped their heads up, otter-like, each trailed by a triangular wake. On a pier just at the edge of sight we watched a shadowy group begin, one at a time, to dive into darkness. They moved across the water like a flottilla of cormorants, black beads strung across moonlit water. One by one they hauled themselves up to shore, an evolution of young men emerging from the lake. In the dark there is only contrast in the absence of color, and each sleek body was lunar-pale, with that tell-tale patch of loin-fur: nary a stitch of clothing. Their boy-bits dangled in silhouette, backlit by the moon.

I giggled at the show in spite of a sense of awe at the primal beauty of it all.

The naked boys retrieved towels
and skirted their mid-sections.
Show over.

Encore! Encore!