Not very

Not very active on this blog recently.  Please visit my other blog, South Englishtown Gazette, where I post more frequently.  

Max Tries to Make a Friend

Max sits, staring at the backdoor screen.

She walks, step-step, step-step, closer to the doorway,

eyes never wavering from

the silhouette of a newly-hatched basilisk lizard

clinging to the screen.

Slowly, gently, she reaches out her paw, touches the screen.

In an instant, the tiny basilisk leaps away, disappearing off the deck.

Max sits, staring at the backdoor screen, 

           waiting for her friend to return.

Half a Year

Half a year to be absent from the shores of my true life

was harder than I thought it could be;

harder than it ought to be, to step back into my old life.

Half a year wrapped in the cold throes of old obligations;

creating the endings I sought,

shaping forever-links to friends and memories.

Half a year to lay the old to satisfactory rest;

           the past is settled, the future is open

Lilies at the edge of the jungle.

Notes – I wrote this after spending 6 months in Rochester away from Dennis and Max in Belize while tying up my career at Mayo.  It was much more stressful than I had anticipated it would be, even though I visited Belize twice during that time. 

Tropical Fruit

The watermelon is ripe

when the agouti takes a bite.

The guava is nearly at its peak

when a jays jabs it with its beak.

The cashew fruit is ready

when the parrot has it in its belly.

We have yet to see

if it will be we

who are the pigs

that get the figs.

Too Much

 

 Too much to see, to feel,

to hear, to smell, to taste.

Overwhelmed, I close my eyes;

senses meld into new configurations.

Music joins the wind’s caress and the scent of the jungle night.

Sounds from the sea dissolve into the taste of wine on my tongue,

and my skin remembers the heat from the noonday sun.

In and out, 

my breaths turn my self in side out,

raw and exposed to the world. 

The Belt in the Back of the Wardrobe

The belt in the back of the wardrobe

is blooming with galaxies and nebulae of green.

New worlds unsuspected,

still unseen by the Hubble telescope,

expand independently of intelligent life on earth. 

The Volunteer

  

Creamy whiteness hidden inside magenta skin, the volunteer sweet potato

joins purple, white, green, and orange, destined for roasting.  

 

Tracks in the Sand

 

Tracks in the Sand

Who made these small tracks with toes of three?

Not a bird, not a lizard, not a crab.

Not a cat, not a dog.

Not a rat, not a possum, not a person.

A shy agouti, the local “rabbit”,

comes out at dawn and comes out at dusk,

leaving only its tracks out at midday.

 

Passion Fruit Passion

 

Orange-colored, seed-filled juice lurks inside the maroon-hued passion fruit.  Flamboyant color is matched by intense taste and tartness; a treat to the tongue and to the eye.

 

Friends

Dear friends, old friends.

We talk of days bygone, days more recent, days to come.

Days we will remember; days that define our lives, define ourselves.

To be a friend is to be 

forever.

Hammock Time

The siren hammock calls to me,

with claims of rejuvenating afternoon rest.

 

Shell Ginger in the Rain

Shell ginger blossoms fall heavily from their protective sepals,

collecting raindrops as they dangle toward the ground below. 

 

Small Whelk

Spiral gyres of decreasing size 

reduced to a skeleton by water and sand

tell of years gone past

in life and death of the small whelk.

Jan 31, 2013

Bumping along Monkey River Road,

warm breeze on hot skin.

Happiness flies into the car on

the sweet scent of orange blossoms.

Jan 30, 2013

A week or so ago, I captured some caterpillars on one of our mango trees.  I am having a go at rearing them to see what they turn into ...

Wee hairy beasties in yellow, orange, and black

move with imperceptible slowness across the mango leaves,

vacuuming off the surface layer of cells and

leaving brown in their wake.  

Small agents of destruction, growing larger every day.

Jan 29, 2013

This small stone came to me today as I was painting the window frames in our cabana and thinking about all the other small stones I have read recently.  ;-)

White paint, like snow, covers a lot of ugly.

Would we sing the joy of a summer day

without the gloom of winter by which to know it?

Rich burnt orange rim in soft focus,
the moon peeks over the dark grey ocean.
With every moment, it grows larger, brighter
until at last it slips free of the dark water.
Gold slowly yields to silver and grey to black.
The moon remains oblivious to its transformation.

Jan 26, 2013

Stevie Ray plays in the background,
the moon dances in the fore.
I'm stuck in the middle - there is no better place.

Jan 25, 2013

bad writing mojo yesterday.  this one is revised.

seried mountain ridges,
painted flat; 
each a paler shade of grey
against a sky of faintest rose.