A summer of extremes cancels everything
Your return to the American south
Your disillusionment with microbreweries
Your unattended garden
Late afternoon, we observe
women, skirts tied in knots to their waists
squatting, digging for mussels and seashells
& I say these beaches are mere flat waters that consume
quiet anger crushing against the empty horizon
A dog barking up the crowded beach
has found shelter under a camel’s belly
The camel has the legs and face of a beggar
worn with the weight of long years gone hungry
So worn, she refuses to eat some roses the bathers offer.
The complicit Moroccan plays beach tennis
while the horse digs his grave
while the camel dreams about another desert,
do not serve the ponies cardamom coffee or mint tea,
they had enough Molotov cocktails in the backyard of the emperor’s feast
Stop talking about human survival,
biosphere survival,
social engagement,
and political disengagement
Let us go for a walk, we are losing light.