Inflatable Pool

BY GEORGE STARBUCK

At least it couldn’t possibly get hotter.

Just look at our young daughter:
up to her ears in water
like a sea otter.

Her brother: up to nothing, like a sloth.

Or me, besting them both
like some indigenous aquatic growth.

Not that I’m loath
to play the hale and hell-for-leather father —

It’s just that we’d all rather
I didn’t bother.