Summer phlox is blooming now and it is about 2 feet tall. It is a native perennial.

Here is a link that might be useful: Phlox paniculata

I am spending the weekend near Helen, GA this weekend. I am seeing summer Phlox all around here. I haven't noticed it in my corner of sw ga, but will check into this to see if it can survive our humid long hot summers. Do you know?

Is this native found in local nurseries around Helen / Athens? Or is it a wild flower?

Phlox 'David' is a cultivar of the native phlox paniculata.

As woody says, you should be able to find it and other cultivars ("cultivated varieties") at nurseries.

Here is a link that might be useful: Phlox 'David'

Found out what I've been seeing is Cleome. Anyone with any experience or comments on it in SW GA? Compare to Pholox, David?

Cleome is an annual. Check these links. Are these what you are seeing?

http://www.floridata.com/ref/C/cleo_has.cfm

http://davesgarden.com/pf/go/6/index.html

Cleome reseeds a lot so you always end up with a lot of babies the next year to replace the one that died over the winter.

i like cleome and grow it each year. don't have to save seed - i just let the last few of the season self-seed and they will come back next year. they grow much taller than my garden phlox and bloom a little longer.
mine are currently about 5' tall. the flowers are not fragrant like soome phlox cultivars; in fact, they have a peculiar "herbal" odor when the foliage is touched.
the sphinx moths like to visit them in the afternoons.
if you will cut off the (many) seedpods that develop during the growing season, you will not have as many seedlings to pull next year and they will continue to produce flowers a bit longer.
i believe there are pink, purple and white-flowered forms, perhaps even a dwarf one.