1.
Mouthwash-blue sea,
Iconic rocks seen from an infinity pool
Warm as the ocean is cool.
I play volleyball with Mexican children
While my love in a bikini water-stomps to country tunes.
There's nothing to prevent heaven,
Not even a cloud beneath the kind sun,
The mission light, the palms saying something
You have to be slow enough to hear --
All you can eat papaya.
Mouthwash-blue sea,
Iconic rocks seen from an infinity pool
Warm as the ocean is cool.
I play volleyball with Mexican children
While my love in a bikini water-stomps to country tunes.
There's nothing to prevent heaven,
Not even a cloud beneath the kind sun,
The mission light, the palms saying something
You have to be slow enough to hear --
All you can eat papaya.
2.
In sprouting palms a yellow wren
Poses for a snap,
Purple balloons float across the pool
Like there could ever be too much fun.
The cactus shines in the sun.
There is no sense to anything anyone does
But the birds speak the impeccable logic of the palms.
In sprouting palms a yellow wren
Poses for a snap,
Purple balloons float across the pool
Like there could ever be too much fun.
The cactus shines in the sun.
There is no sense to anything anyone does
But the birds speak the impeccable logic of the palms.
3.
Trouble in paradise -- a blue drink --
"What's in it?" -- "It's delicious!" --
The fix was in on the poolside trivia game --
All relaxation stopped and the faces
Became those who can't win.
Trouble in paradise -- a blue drink --
"What's in it?" -- "It's delicious!" --
The fix was in on the poolside trivia game --
All relaxation stopped and the faces
Became those who can't win.
4.
Annabelle sells bracelets by the seashore
In a white robe and straw fedora,
Patiently waiting behind the rope
For tourists to cross, the few
Who are unafraid
To negotiate her down to pennies for her day.
She faces away from the sea,
Toward listless luxury
On a beach that's burning.
Annabelle sells bracelets by the seashore
In a white robe and straw fedora,
Patiently waiting behind the rope
For tourists to cross, the few
Who are unafraid
To negotiate her down to pennies for her day.
She faces away from the sea,
Toward listless luxury
On a beach that's burning.
5.
The joker laughs -- ruido --
The cards always tell a joke --
But the tablecloth is neat
And the breeze from the veranda fans
Will make you forget
Whatever it was you willed yourself
In hopelessness
To remember.
The joker laughs -- ruido --
The cards always tell a joke --
But the tablecloth is neat
And the breeze from the veranda fans
Will make you forget
Whatever it was you willed yourself
In hopelessness
To remember.
6.
The streets of no mind;
Corazon,
Where all is sensation
Regaled
As a king is kissed by a fool.
They wait all night and day
For the birds Americanos
To light again their dream corners
And fall in the sinote
Where they play.
The streets of no mind;
Corazon,
Where all is sensation
Regaled
As a king is kissed by a fool.
They wait all night and day
For the birds Americanos
To light again their dream corners
And fall in the sinote
Where they play.
7.
At the pink hotel
St. Michael slays a lizard
While the Spanish virgin looks on in wood
And a blind parakeet named Adolpho
Sings at every opened door.
At the pink hotel
St. Michael slays a lizard
While the Spanish virgin looks on in wood
And a blind parakeet named Adolpho
Sings at every opened door.
8.
Schools of fish spawned from the chum thrown on the bay;
The death boats drop from the landing;
The Mexican Navy plays drum reveille less than crisply;
Dolphins are kept in a concrete house as therapists for children;
You can pose with a marlin as the captor or the captive;
The big fishing boats (owned by Microsoft, Walmart, Exxon Mobil)
Schools of fish spawned from the chum thrown on the bay;
The death boats drop from the landing;
The Mexican Navy plays drum reveille less than crisply;
Dolphins are kept in a concrete house as therapists for children;
You can pose with a marlin as the captor or the captive;
The big fishing boats (owned by Microsoft, Walmart, Exxon Mobil)
Eat the little fishing boats (owned by Juan)
And the tiniest vie for scraps
As grey pelicans wait grimly for food.
The worlds are so far apart they don't even collide,
The well-rounded views of wealth
And the half-completed skeletons
Pass like ghosts exchanging pesos --
All they know of each other is the sea.
As grey pelicans wait grimly for food.
The worlds are so far apart they don't even collide,
The well-rounded views of wealth
And the half-completed skeletons
Pass like ghosts exchanging pesos --
All they know of each other is the sea.
9.
The rhythm of the waves,
Desert clouds, palm fronds,
The shadows on the rocks --
The only things that stay.
The rhythm of the waves,
Desert clouds, palm fronds,
The shadows on the rocks --
The only things that stay.
10.
The mission garden
Date night
Restaurant,
Hard feelings softened
By the yellow tulip lights
Until a few sobs drop to the tiles
From the skies
To baptize the lovers
Before the monsoon starts
And fills the water glasses,
Clears the tables, sends the still
Smiling hostess on a mission of mercy
To gather all the cushions
Before they float away.
The customers have given up
On Campari umbrellas
And detach to the oak room
And its orange light to sip
Incandescent green drinks
And watch the streets turn to beaches
In sheets of surf-glow black.
The mission garden
Date night
Restaurant,
Hard feelings softened
By the yellow tulip lights
Until a few sobs drop to the tiles
From the skies
To baptize the lovers
Before the monsoon starts
And fills the water glasses,
Clears the tables, sends the still
Smiling hostess on a mission of mercy
To gather all the cushions
Before they float away.
The customers have given up
On Campari umbrellas
And detach to the oak room
And its orange light to sip
Incandescent green drinks
And watch the streets turn to beaches
In sheets of surf-glow black.
At the top of the tower
A blue light beckons
As if what happened before the rains
Was just a pretty picture,
A backdrop to a game with rules more ancient
Than even the masterchef here understands,
At the end of which is ruination,
Mysterious and hopeful and beautiful
But ruination nevertheless.
11.
There never was an empire here
But they make it seem so noble
To be so broken and ashamed,
As happy as the dead, to heal
Those orphaned of their Gods
With nothing but hand-painted skulls.
Such visions of what never was
Can take the place of heaven
Everpresent, never ending,
Giggling in the breeze.
12.
Trained we are like seals
In ways to see the sky and sea;
Blue means one thing, grey another,
Some valence on our lives gone flickering by,
Sealed as good or bad. But what if
The water, churning in, is as green
As Senor Frog's lime-green philosophy
And as black as Yucatan Chocolate
At the same time? If blue is fractured
By beveled grades of slate?
Heaven is as real as what's let go,
The need for blue, the attitude toward grey,
Letting the green moments stay impossible.
The rocks on the other side are full of spray,
Just now. You may have the food
Here, but that's where the fish are.
13.
Angry in paradise
Two black swans,
The people caged outside,
Are overseen by naked Neptune
At the Roman fountain end
Where busts of the Caesars reside.
They pick at their food,
Pick at each other,
Snort and snarl at humans,
These two of a kind
Flown in from Namibia
For reasons the toucans don't understand.
They pace savagely behind their well-appointed wire --
No amount of blue sky and surf frosting
For waverunners, parasails, hangliders will do --
No quantity of happy hour Margarita's and Texas Slammers
In the the deep bass pulse disco light show
On fluourescent Mexican folk art while an 80's cover band
Drives people back like cattle to their youth
To reclaim what they never obtained in the first place
Will keep them from craning their long black necks
Like plumber's snakes looking for a clog
In their sandy demense -- no --
There aren't enough endless pools of bikini'd beauties
And white-washed houses with blue miniarettes
And cliffside drives at night along the Pacific
Past immense haciendas lit with golden light.
No tradewinds breezes will ever soothe the irritations
They feel. Do they know they are black
In this white swan world of beauty?
Is there some onyx and malachite pool somewhere
To call home? Neptune doesn't say, he only
Looks on with the contempt of the ocean,
His curls, trident and impossibly small penis unconcerned
With the problems of two ornery birds.
They are some half-baked symbol, one supposes,
Of nothingness, how black is white and good is bad
And rareness is unexceptional - a gag whose humor
Has long since turned to bile, for no one had the curiosity
To ask for the punch line -- maybe these birds resent that,
How the joke their lives were made into
Was never even laughed at --
Maybe they are laughing
In their squealing swan tongue
To show that they are funny, really,
Despite everything.
