tiquette et l'Esthetique Tropicale

Our mint tea cools slowly in this heat,

and off to the right, a single sail

cuts through the multiple shades of blue

I have seen only in the Caribbean:

blues and blue-greens deepening to indigo.

On the half-terrace, everything is more

than summer, a brine-loving tree

(complete with methyl orange petals)

littering the walk with the withered pods

children sometimes use as maracas.

At this height, things fall away from us -

Look! Hibiscus cascading to the lawn,

the reds spilling over into pinks

then landing in fusions, inflorescence

a botanist would die for.

How easy to succumb to the tropics:

the flora, the white sand, the seascape,

the ever-present salt air of the casual.

At the mineral baths, virtually no one notices

the percussion of water falling down the rocks.