Glimpses

Some of my favorite glimpses of Antigua so far. And another poem.

Can you spot BOTH dogs barking at us?

Saint Francis

Outside a tuk-tuk

Inside a tuk-tuk!

There goes the neighborhood.

~ Parque Central (2)

This morning, an earthquake, hangers rattling,

our arms out, surfing the floor of the living room.

Walking the kids to school, a phone call,

“Did you feel that?!

It spilled my coffee!”

Beyond the school,

a woman trying to sell me a newspaper,

wishing me well

with no sale.

Then the man, the same man in the same place

as yesterday

and the day before

in his maybe-was-once-white dress shirt,

blue trousers, straw caballero hat . . .

And my eyes begin to see things with love--

sudden benevolence in the hand-painted signs,

the cobblestone sidewalk.

A shaded bench in Parque Central,

the morning building momentum,

mountain sun lighting the fountain on fire . . .

A woman with shorn hair and not enough clothing

yells from the edge of the square,

her jacket a whip, abusing the fence with all her strength,

throwing her primal rage through her voice,

aiming it here, there, at him, at me, at you,

all of us accomplices to suffering, seen or unseen,

heard or unheard.

She lurches into traffic, slamming the jacket

on a passing car, leaving it in the street

though she will miss it later

when the sun drops behind the volcanoes

and the stringy straps of her dress

offer no protection

from the night.

She passes round the corner

and everyone at Parque Central turns back to their business

and leisure.

When the echo of her wild cursing has faded,

a park attendant in a safety green smock

snatches her jacket from the road,

adds it to the trash,

hefting the barrel to his shoulder and taking it wherever it is trash goes.