August 2024
Bio Note: I am a wandering troubadour whose poetry appears in over 500 journals on six continents, and 24 collections of poetry – including In the Jaguar Valley (dancing girl press, 2023) and Santa Marta Ayres (Origami Poems Project, 2024). I also author travel narratives, articles and guidebooks. My writing has been honored by the Parliamentary Poet Laureate of Canada (2011), and nominated for the Best of the Net and the Pushcart Prize. I journey through Latin America with my faithful knapsack Rocinante, listening to the voices of the pueblos and Earth.
Another Weekend Escape
This other Saturday
I arrive
at lowest tide
On the beach
a fisherman
butchers his day’s catch
spread out across
a sea turtle’s dark shell,
people waiting
with open bags
inhaling, exhaling
in the breeze
This other Saturday
I walk northward
on this beach
to where the low tide
yet laps
the breakwaters
boulders studded
with limpets & barnacles
closed tight
against the piercing sun
closed tight
until the sea returns
fractured boulders
where blue-bellied crabs
seek refuge
from my
approaching presence
Soon my way is blocked
by the sea, the boulders
& houses destroyed
by higher waves
buzzards perched atop
the ruins, waiting
to feast on the
rotting carcass
of a sea lion
I cut inland
until the beach
again emerges
beyond saltweed-
twined dunes
a broader strand
impressed by
a horse’s hooves
& the tracks
of whimbrels &
oystercatchers
where the breeze
is now a wind
twisting fragile grasses
anchored in the sand
strewn with
crescent-moon
fragments of shells
Yet Listening
Yet
embraced by the
ebony night
I sway in a
sapphire hammock
half-awake
listening
Your voice
thunders through
empty streets, through
my window
I close the shutter
with the burst
of dawn’s
downpour
Yet
listening to you
Changó
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