The title promises a fashion statement, and the poem delivers one, though a strange one. The speaker's "summer suit" is a flowered vest, and the vest turns out to be less a garment than a landscape. It is red like an owl at dinner, green like a little park, and that park is full of dust and wind, with the occasional dribble of rain. The clothing and the weather blur together, so that wearing the vest feels like standing out in a shabby, windblown corner of the world.
The ending changes the tone. After the playful comparisons, the speaker admits to "so many aches" and says they are "forced to take / and hug." The humor seems to cover something more tender: a body, perhaps an aging one, that hurts. The mood is wry and gently sad. The speaker doesn't complain loudly but dresses the pain up, then holds it close, like something that can't be shaken off and might as well be embraced.