A Shadow in Yucatan (2 page)

Often enough to
latch-key mind, whether to call the tree man?
Or wait for the hurricane?

This is the old
quarter of the Grove, built
when folks were bright with hope and standards
before the boom and greenback brass..
They were clean shaven then, and not too clever,
they built small with chain link fences,
they laid paths and still sink flowers.

(Five years, on
average, before a sleek Estate is parked fenceless further south,
protected by the German Shepherd and strolling Securicor.)

‘
It’s nearer to the
beach y’know, and Arthur? Why, he doesn’t mind the drivin’

Twenty-eighth
on Saturday sleeps late, or walks the dog...
No Afghan or elegant Saluki, but a home-grown sensible get-down
Rover, part pet and part policeman.
Sniffing its beat from Hibiscus to Azalea, sneezing, pausing,
lifting and retracing...
Tangling skeins of trotted scent along the clipped grass sidewalk,
four blocks to the Causeway,
and once over, to the Bay.

Man, now see
him move!

At seven the
street is a long lick of paint.
The Banyan boon of shade at the corner belongs to the
Architect.
(His curved walls are cedar, all other walls are white.)
No tooth shadows gnaw the surfaces as they do at noon:
The tattered spikes that serve the night are raised portcullis
high, but the garrison is in its vest, and the mailman’s been and
gone.

Now the sun is
cracked for breakfast in the middle of the street; spatters the
sidewalk, and the back of the newsboy’s knees...
Only sleep soiled quarters grey and dim, door hatches plastic
sealed...
The air-propeller din sucked greedily through straw of mesh and
spat across the sheet.

‘
Hey Honey? D’ya
hear me? Would you say that fella’s queer?
Y’ know that one that wears those shorts and those shades against
the glare?’

*****

Stephanie stirs
to the flapping of sheets, and the creaking revolution of a
line...
Slatted sun flickers...
The windowsill flares, and is doused by the closing eye.
The open palm reflexes, the pillow wrist reclines, her body curves
towards its plinth and melts again in sleep.
The clock-still, washer-numb, rag-bound Sabbath sulks.

Mrs. Martins in
mules beneath the mangoes treads a protest in sand and suds across
to the line and back.
Shuffles to stay shod, slaps and damns the mosquitoes.
Body bowls fall un-harnessed, roll beneath the housecoat...
(blessed midges take advantage in the shade)

She feels for a
pocket of pegs, spins, secures, spins and reaches, and scratching a
buttock tracks back.
Mrs. Martins is shaking her Sabbath fist.
Shalom
.

‘
So Abel how does it
look? It looks good huh?
Your auntie, Abel, on the Sabbath in rollers, at the mangle
maybe?
To honour that wheedling whippet, long-legged layabout, your uncle
Will
(not will enough to stay alive even.)
Not that I am noticing the difference..
him half buried in the fishing canoe, paddling lazy through the
saw-grass with his pipe...
Did she ever tell you (your mama with her shoes and hats) that your
uncle was an alligator?
But still Abel, how does it look? I should also be enjoying the
hats, and today dressing for Schul’

Miriam, widow
of goy Wilbur, continues to soliloquize without malice.
Wilbur, cause of curses has been dead too long.

Abel, adulated
heir, prepares for manhood.
The uncertain Sabbath must be monitored;
He consults his gold Rolex, picks his nose and turns the pages of a
comic he is not reading...

‘So why must he read when he
inherits an apartment north of Fontainebleu
?’

‘
Ah, the tenant is
awake. I will ask when the flushing has a decent interval. If I
could bring myself to eat bacon, we could be having breakfast. A
daughter I wish I had. To adopt I couldn’t afford; to make believe
costs a person nothing.’

The Specialist

Synchronised signals on Lauderdale thread
the lace of the idling engine
...
A line up of short-order shacks elbows for a view of the
parade.

Champ beats
Burger-king, knocked down to Pete’s Pizzas, and two to you from
Charlie’s Cornets...
(bigger you can’t buy)

Stand aside.
Yonder Palm Beach...
(cut rates for condominium convenience)

‘
For a place near
the water, what’s ninety thousand bucks?
We need to moor the catamaran, honey’

Well
before.
Before the Boulevards, and Porcelain Parlour, Cassata Cafe and
Originals by Appointment, the Florida fanfare is scored for
braggart brass, despairing cheerfulness...

Flaggin y’down with a
swollen tongue...
Only one, jus one more soda from de poor,
the undimmed Pepsodent poor

One hundred
eighty sixth street, north?
Right. Four blocks later, left.
Another street, undistinguished, communal grass, paved ways,
porticos; hedge-less by decree...

‘Colonial rambling’
developers would call it
(spreading their signet rings to cast the shadows of illimitable
oaks and graciousness)
‘All that in two
pillars and a porch, anodized, weatherized, and warranted for two
years against rust.’

*****

Dr. Paul
Robsart lurks behind the tiger blind in button-down battledress and
horn-rims

‘
He’ll have ya
believin Memphis is in Massachusetts’

Chimes strike
salad welcome, daily-dozen, apple-a-day ratio of health.
Visitors are here through carelessness,
the air-conditioning primed for punishment.

‘Take a seat honey. We’ll need
to take y’details.
’

The mother
reluctant crosses adolescent knees.
The off-white chairs are carefully squared, the carpet piled like
straw.
The face behind the glass is gashed, and continues to dry its
nails...

*****

‘
The Name of the
Father?’

The apostrophe
in the perplexed gut?
The sleeping spawn alive and palpitating asks for no father...

‘
Profession of the
Father?’

What did the
man profess?
That smooth sweet talker, un-confessing party fella, the walk-away
soft-spoken con, gentle enough in loving, nice enough, no
more...

‘I think he
Knocks'n'Sells
...’

‘
Name of the
Mother?’

Ah me? I have a
name?
I, the spreading shade of passing pleasure, I am never
asked...
A dusted delicacy of quick consumption. I carry the name of Nature;
wax like a ruddy redwood to let fall one perfect seed.
Must I needs also a name?

‘
Stephanie de
Steffano’

‘
That’s real purty.
I like that. Y’from Italy or somethin?
’

‘
Brooklyn’

‘
Y’don’t say...Form
is simple. Jus sign here...’

Simple? Sure.
Insurance heads off with credit card, addresses marry
telephones...
Symptoms last, with measurements and morning sickness.

‘
Powder room’s
through dere. Jus slip y’things
Dere’s a gown behin de door.’

Dr Paul is
awaited with sober knees and goose- green skin...
The couch facilitates disembowelling by holding horse heels in the
air. Guernica!
She chooses a chair...

Debbie Robsart,
cute in College, consents to sit for the wall.
His children credentials freckle faced, soured by lemon sorbet
socks and fizzy frills...
Dr Paul does it by the book.

There are books
besides, regimental, piped with gilt, ordered not consulted.
Two dead flies at the window, unobserved by the cleaner, are his
burden of misfortune.

He enters,
stomaching a clip-pad, with thoughtful clicking tongue...
Fingers straggle pensive to the safe lapel, and spatula...
The tapping toe peruses...ten seconds is chewing gum, stretched
ever longer...

‘
Date of last bleed
was when did y’say?’

(The Ides of
May I?)
‘Fifteenth, last
month’

He spins the
Winthrop calculator (roulette reminder not to be on the links when
stakes are drawn)

The
belly-bolting, tumbling-tide-of- help-me-Father
could
be
arranged to suit the Caribbean cruise...

The raft of
verbal boundary nailed. The sails will circum-navigate with
careless quipping ease...

‘
People do this
everyday. Relax’

The concierge
in clogs and crackling skirt, hoists limbs astride the
stirrups,
covers the calyx that hangs its shadowed head.
The un-tossed rose dies in the dark, and withers to the compass
steel.

‘
You’ve got a pelvis
for an Atlas’

He withdraws
the gander beak and drops it in the cackling dish.

‘
That’s it Marcel.
Let the girl go free...’

The carcass
thighs are soft; the vanquished body drags itself over the sand to
a hook.

Sunday-Key West.

I shall go hang on the
Continent’s tail, beyond the Barfly at Sloppy Joe’s
Heedless of his beard and belching, my oaths will be toes in the
aimless water...Nostrils to the brindled air.
Space will shimmer scents from Tenochtitlan.
Gold bracelets bind me to the suicide of Cortez.
I am lost, but I shall find. They will never follow me.

I shall tread juice
from tobacco clippings, and watch the old men spit
Havana ola, in the speckled shadows of the straw market, my feet in
the ashes, my cheeks smeared with clay, wanton, outcast like
them.
I shall not lick or roll. I shall not have to work
I shall simply be there.
For a day.

I shall eat smoked
mackerel, pungent with wood, steamed by the water, in a tipping
boat.
The heaving horizon I shall tame to undulation.
I have spoken. I shall swim.
I shall tip boat-barrel and glide among the hawsers of forgotten
hulks, black amid keels, menacing with mouths. Treasure is
forgetfulness.
I shall sink.

I shall surface like
the mermaid seal, untouchable.
Drag my gleaming limb.
Lollop and skid on the board-walk to watch the taffeta water summon
the world to drink.
I shall squint through rust and bitumen.
Bite through my lip.

The surgeon sun will
fit me legs, brace my back and bandage my eyes.
I will be led to convalesce.
The gold gulf wind will draw me unobserved past shutters, rocking
chairs and limes.
The machismo of yesterday is a hat by the water’s edge.

‘Mein Gott, the
tenant is bedraggled, das liebes Kind is fried...
She’ll look like the lobster tomorrow...butter is for burns, but am
I interfering?
I’ll just leave the iced tea.
I hope she’ll talk or something. What is it now that’s
changed?
Something worse? Or better?
Inside somewhere I’m sniffing steel.

Monday- Brooklyn.