* * *
If there were another world: orange skies and
purple flowers; tall languorous women
waiting behind the bouganvillias, each with her own dark voice
to send those low calls toward the night;
and huge birds, bigger than ponies.
soaring through the crimson skies; with bloodstone plumage
and shadowy wings making windstorms as they passed.
and a soft succulent silence,
and the low drifting calls of tall women,
waiting behind the lattices; and piles of oranges in the
streetstalls, piled higher than the houses,
mangoes, melons, pineapples: all the sweet clear acid orange;
and coconuts, and rich dark beer;
canaries, mockingbirds and parrots jangling in the patio;
