T.S. Eliot wrote, "April is the cruelest month ..."

What would you say? August is _____________________.

islandtime: If Elliot is in, so am I.

August is Caesar Salad to ensure a successful trip to the Commodus.

August is a hellish month, breeding

mildew from the wash closet, causing

the hoary to expire.

August is a majestic month,

Its subjects torpid beneath its airless cloak.

August is the loudest bugs,

a lake too hot for swimming,

and neighbors giving tomatoes.

August is on vacation at the beach.

(or, for minimalists)

August is at the beach.

August is what happens to summer when the vacation money runs out.

August is the anguishing month,
pre-emptive clinging to halcyon days,
feeling the ebb on the horizon
of green, of sun, of youth.

August in the schoolest month, bleeding
backpacks from display stands, ditching
history and choir, spurring
new routes to teen pain.

August is the breath before fall,
an inspiration of heat and thunderstorms,
an expiration of endless summer.

You're not trying to sneak back into ghazal mode are you?

Hi, HAP - In other words, "beware the ides of August"?

August is what happens to summer when the vacation money runs out.

Hi, waltz, You sound a little Ben Franklin-ish here. I didn't know if anyone would be interested in playing little poem games, but I love all the responses and how they often seem to incorporate a poster's personality (your posts always contain a good deal of humor).

islandtime: "beware the ides of August"

Thank you. I was creatively blocked. The ides did it.

August is wilder and more novel than the Ides of March

(Oh, brother).

August: overripe,
bruising, oozing of fullness
already spoiling