I blinked and it seemed as if June was three quarters gone. Summer has made its grand entrance on the wings of a north-west wind.It is here, but not quite. The sun is bright, but it is still kind. The heat is gentle; the nights thrillingly cool. The daylight hours have reached their zenith and from here, it is a slow demise to darker days.
But for now, it is June, the most playful of the summer months. June is when the thought of summer still seems agreeable. When winter-white toes are dipped in turquoise waters and quickly withdrawn with shrill squeals of ‘It’s freezing’ and ‘The water’s still cold’. It is the month when the wheat has been harvested and the baled hay left out in the fields, like giant building blocks of some fantasy castle, until it is loaded on to trucks and stowed away for when the rain comes again.
This is the month when the light takes on certain nuances; when it turns anything it touches to gold. There is an almost syrupy quality to the light. I wonder whether it’s sticky to the touch; talk myself out of bottling it up in a jam-jar and spreading it on my waffles instead of honey.
I hate to admit that there is magic in the light of the solstice. That I want to stretch out under the sky and let its amber fingers tenderly touch my skin; its warm breath delicately kiss my eyelids. This fey light makes me feel as lazy as the big ginger cat that likes to sit on our garden wall. It seems to be purring ‘June is golden. June is golden,’ over and over. The light must have gone to my head. Or I’ve been bewitched by Midas’ touch.
Location: Valletta, June 2013
