Revenant

Even the dead
always drawn to the same
path or place, defy routine
when the earth's rhythm
is sung in a different key.....
From a Creole Belief

Dusk fall

Wind blew off The Gulf
bringing a strange scent and ache
to the weather vane
of her bones, her beautiful
shoulder bones.

Midday

She sits on the balcony
letting her body cool
after a long trip in the heat.

A lace parasol -- briefly
blocks the sun and soundless fear
which has led her to the mainland
and this girlhood place.

A verdigris railing
overlooks the courtyard
where banana trees guard
a glass table and some chairs.

She remembers
resting there, savoring
a lemon ice and watching
her reflection -- her face afloat
on an ocean of sky
where birds flew in the distance.

They did not matter then --
size or species,
just the presence of flight
and green splendor of the garden.

But last night
when a slow caravan of hours
passed through the island churchyard,
she wandered the cypress grove
and laid on the grass dreaming.

Pelicans in The French Quarter,
she dreamt their wings
were stained with oil, overlapping
like these banana leaves,

and the glass table
turned to stone,
a sun dial with no shadow,
no sense of time --

only the permanence
of death and change
___________________________________________

The lovely painting is called, "Ombrelles et Dentelles" or "Parasol and Lace by French artist, Marie-France Riviere. More of her gorgeous work can be viewed at this website, www.griviere.com/expo2000.
Her gallery is definitely worth a visit.