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A Coke can floats,
not yet full enough to sink
fat Vuitton chests are heaved onto
little skiffs
to be taken to her ship.
I listen closely to the Coke can
kissing the quay stone
tink, tink-tink
*
Her entourage exit the Marriott,
alight so quietly,
like sunrise
in a red dress
I’m surprised how tall she is
and how slender
the eloquence
of each soft step she takes
is in the waves, on the waves
today she articulates
her own fate,
her nation’s
we listen closely.
*
After they leave
I sit down with a Guinness
on the terrace, thinking
I light a Camel, inhale
exhale thoughts of Solomon
of gold stocks.
If she gets back
she’ll come back a rock star,
minimum, maybe a metaphor
A dancer on the water,
the morning light in song,
a moment in this harbour,
the hope of living on
Nuff Respec to Claude Lorrain - Seaport with the Embarkation of the Queen of Sheba
photo by Wandering Emu at www.flickr.com
for Billy Mills
Glamorous rambler
putting its show on
in cerise clusters
waving and nodding
over the archway
When you look closer
see how each branch is
dusted with powder
musty and cobwebbed
infected and grey
Dorothy Perkins “martyr to mildew”
still it keeps coming
back every summer
doing its number
**
So small at first the dark marks on the leaves
they passed unnoticed while the buds grew fat
and blooms emerged spreading their coloured silks
shining in the returned and welcome sun
Now as you bend to the familiar scent
confirming summer as you breathe it in
you see the spots have grown and turned to black
and the green shoots of spring are fading fast
Already a few yellowed leaves have curled
the blotch of blight on each draining its life
thin stems that once clung tight will lose their grip
and fall dying to the dry waiting soil
But still above them flames the flowering rose
seeming indifferent to the creeping rot
that from now on ensures its blazing pride
each year will dwindle and enfeebled fade.
.
