The Bay Of Cortes
By Paul Cameron Brown
The sea is a requisitioned article in my possession.
Above, in fat circles of conformity, glide
turkey vultures, their combs
a rich obscenely red.
The guano rocks are isles and stepping stones
of bird waste.
They lie thick and bedeviled with fish fur,
a dull lavender cached hard to the sun
seems to shine a metallic harvest white
as desert rocklets scattered to the breeze.
A speck of a fisherman dots the horizon.
His craft a barque in loneliness across the sea.
Dolphins inveigh the richness of the depths,
persuade latitudes to drift about their wake.
Pelicans sour the parabola distances between light and sound,
become chancy over this distant breath of song.
Above the cliffs and the inner roads that follow
the desert into geometric squares, stand abodes.
The thin supremacy of shadows at dusk disparage the traveller here.
Burros strayed lie dead by the highway's edge.
The liquid depth of the mountains reinforces vulnerability.
The night air is alive with the torment of insects, asplash with sound.
Lights carry an eerie message dotted about the hills.
Feeling alone is a delicacy to be savoured by the standards of the tropic sun.