Thoughts of the summer dance transfix Billington's Cove inhabitants, part 1

Painting by Andy Smith.

From time to time throughout his life Robert wished he'd been born a poet.  He knew enough of the process to realize he could, upon occasion, corral a poetic expression of what he intuited wordlessly.  As much as he hoped this could be one of those moments, he knew he was on his own, no muse in his pocket.  To feel the sun on his face, the way it warmed a building's chilled facade, would be enough of a gift for today.  That the sun's lemony tang would ultimately seep through him, to his feet and the parts of his brain where music and besottedness resided, made him so giddy he worried he might topple to the side of the road in a fit of giggles.