The coquette aesthetic wilts in the high heat we’ve had of late, but also lends its own cooling power to the proceedings. The underlying melancholy of this coquette summer cuts through the hot and humid stretches, dousing the fire with tears of healing and compassion – the tears of having to grow up, even at the ripe age of almost-49. One more year to fifty. 

I’ll be your baby
There’s nothing better I’d rather do
I’m lost completely
I might as well be over the moon

I’d like it if you tried
Before you change my mind
Are you gonna be here with me
I know you better

The perfume of the pink lily is potent – exceedingly floral and cloying in its sweet richness. It’s a lot to take, especially on the hotter days. But that’s the sort of whoozy, dizzying, decadent indulgence that personifies the coquette notion – something sweet and nostalgic, that is somehow too much and never enough at the same time. The coquette lifestyle is pretty but too often unsatisfying – tantalizingly out of reach – an obsessive state of longing and unfulfilled promise.

This momentary ride
This fire by my side
Are you gonna be here with me
You know that

I’ll be your baby
There’s nothing better I’d rather do
I’m lost completely
I might as well be over the moon

Pink moods, mirrored and mimicked by lilies and clouds at sunset, run deceptively deep. At first sight and sensation, they may feel frivolous and foolish, something to be dismissed or denied – the very impetus of what drives the melancholy of a coquette moment – but how surprisingly resonant they remain, outlasting the ephemeral and fleeting nature we think we know.

The pink lilies glow as the night arrives, but only if the moon is present, which brings out the lighter shading of their throats. On warmer nights, the perfume becomes deliriously potent, an intoxicating lure for all creatures seeking sweetness and beauty. It is the sigh of a summer evening. 

You call me up at night
Imaginary lines
Are you gonna go back to sleep
I know you better
Than you know yourself
I’m only saying play your hand with someone else (someone else)
Don’t tell me how to be your baby
There’s nothing better I’d rather do
I’m lost completely
I might as well be over the moon
I might as well be over the moon

This post is much too moody for daylight hours, so I’ve hidden it in minutes leaving up to the bewitching hour of midnight. A half-moon dangled between the pine boughs, and some star or planet was right beside it, keeping it company on a calm sky of the deepest ocean blue. A song then, for a day and evening that has been bewitching, bothersome, and bafflingly bewildering – a song that has been posted here before in Ella Fitzgerald’s brilliant rendering of it from sunnier days that seem to have taken place ages ago…

It was a bothersome day because of the bugs – even with a heavy spritzing of insect repellent, and a preliminary yard fogging, they would not leave me alone as I attempted to clear up our side yard. Upwards of ten years have passed since I last tackled that section of our property, and that’s much too long to let anything go. The vines have soared fifty feet into the pine and oak trees – the bane of  bittersweet and Virginia creeper – both taken a hold of the entire area. Sprouts of little shrubs have become trees, and pulling them up by the roots took its toll on my neck last week, and my back today – another bothersome aspect of the day. I know enough not to pull too hard, I really do, and still I find myself thinking I can do one more, that my back is the same supple thing it was in my 20’s, and it’s simply not. 

The bothersome grows into the bewildering, as the news reports of an assassination attempt on a possible dictator come onto the television, as if the news couldn’t get any more depressing and worrisome. That one evil, corrupt, indicted felon can so destroy a country with half the country’s blessing is still a bewildering mystery to me. 

And so I do my best to discover the bewitching that begins and ends the song, but I am at a loss. This summer only continues where last summer left off – no resolution, no happy ending, only more loose ends, more questions, more worries and sadness and wonder. 

Now I will move into a midnight meditation, to shake off the mucky emotions of the day and hopefully find a place of peace for a calm stretch of slumber. 

First things first: there is no ‘x’ in ‘espresso’. Kudos for getting that right in this song.

Second things second: not every song that hits big is a summer jam.

Third things third: this is a definite summer jam. Silly, trifling, bordering on ridiculous, with a frivolous, semi-cheeky video to match, Sabrina Carpenter’s ‘Espresso’ is the sort of softly-percolating shuffler that crests easily through the sunny season, when pool, beach, sun, and surf are the only orders of the day. We so badly need that sort of escapism right now, I got out of my pajamas and sat for a couple of nonsensical espresso-themed shots while this song cast its languid spell over a hot and humid day.

I can’t relate to desperation
My ‘give a fucks’ are on vacation
And I got this one boy
And he won’t stop calling
When they act this way
I know I got ’em

Too bad your ex don’t do it for ya
Walked in and dream came trued it for ya
Soft skin and I perfumed it for ya
I know I Mountain Dew it for ya
That morning coffee, brewed it for ya
One touch and I brand newed it for ya

For those who care to know, size does matter… so keep your eye on the cup. (And relax, this isn’t a real espresso – nobody wants me on caffeine. That’s how foolish this whole thing truly is.)

Now he’s thinkin’ ’bout me every night, oh
Is it that sweet? I guess so
Say you can’t sleep, baby, I know
That’s that me, espresso
Move it up, down, left, right, oh
Switch it up like Nintendo
Say you can’t sleep, baby, I know
That’s that me, espresso

Oh look, I’m an actor, pretending this cup of Caffein-Free Diet Coke is a super-hot Espresso. Witness the range. Marvel at the wonder. Sip carefully at this [ding-ding] steam heat.