Caye Caulker
In the café below
the locals talk about the old times
about Eve and the apple
about Paradise lost
about how all the bottles
washed up on the shore
carry the same message.
pelicans plummet into the bluebottle sea
sting rays undulate
out on the coral reef
tiny organisms
fret about climate change
and that damn carbonic acid
I fink the pH is dropping, I really do
meanwhile, over in San Pedro
on the Redneck Riviera
hermetically sealed resorts
march north towards Mexico
and thin, blond soccer moms
mingle with sun-damaged matrons
dedicated to the preservation
of floral print muumuus.
in the café below, Bob Marley’s still jammin’.
This poem has had a few lives. Participating in open link over at earthweal. Head over and check out Brendan’s thought provoking and eloquent post .
Stopdraggingthepanda 
Love it! Especially that last stanza, the mess of humanity in gawdawful muumuus!
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Thanks Yvonne…glad you enjoyed it!
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Nero fiddled while Rome burned. Some things never change. Until the very end. Excellent writing that hurts to read.
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Thanks Jade, much appreciated…JIM
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You are very welcome.
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I can almost hear the hubbub in the restaurant below…..I love the counterpoint italicized lines, and the imagery. Wonderful.
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Just catching up here, thanks Sherry…much appreciated.
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The askant eye here takes it all in — the indolent Margaritavillans, the bottles sempaphoring vanishing bluenose, shellfish ghosting in ghost PH, the merciless crucifex of pleasure carried by revenant humans trying to squeeze the last of their pleasures from the world’s wounds. What a highfive the crabs will clack when the last message in the final Dos Equis is blank — Anyhoo, thanks for bringing it to earthweal, keep ’em coming … Brendan
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and thank you Brendan, your comment is a poem in itself! JIM
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Oh I love this..especially the dedication to floral print muumuus. We sit and watch us drown in plastic and humor error as if tomorrow the sun won’t reduce us to ash.
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Those muumuus need a champion…..thanks Susie!
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It reads to me like bearing witness – to both our large and small failings.
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thanks for your comment, Rosemary!
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I love the revolving points of view in this, from removed observer, to a kind of hemingwayish beachcomber, to coral reefer inhabitants and the yuppies. The italic lines separated from the body of the poem underline your message lightly but indelibly in some very lyric phrases. When all the messages in the bottles are identical, perhaps someone is really trying to tell us something–I enjoyed this poem very much–it’s excellent.
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Thank you, you are very generous!
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Even unwinding in as laid-back a place as Caye Caulker is no escape from our ravaging of the environment.
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…the jaundiced eye!
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