Mar 14, 2012 2 min read

Second Thoughts While Waiting to Make a Left Turn

Onto Periwinkle Way at Height of Season

Maybe creating the paradise was too easy,

maybe the overlooked place we built against the current fashion,

the shell filled beaches we kept replenishing with borrowed sand,

the great big sanctuary we convinced the Feds to protect and maintain,

the panoramic bridge raised fixed against our objections,

maybe they were too much for paradise hunger to handle;

maybe the battered denuded Eden that greeted us after Hurricane Charley,

the island powerless and steaming in the post-hurricane sun,

the despised Australian Pines toppled into chaotic piles,

the survivor trees left standing on Periwinkle like beheaded caryatids,

were not grim enough reminders of paradise without us;

and maybe the machine-gun staccato of generators

drowned out by the brutal chainsaws, the thunder of disposal trucks,

the hammering of roof repairs, and the army of pickups,

maybe the cacophony of cleanup and rebuilding

only whets the appetite for paradise;

maybe the debacle of drawbridge debate backfiring,

the bitching and the bickering and the blame-placing,

the acrimony and sanctimony of builders and anti-builders

polluting the once polite air of paradise,

maybe broken thus, the paradise heart can never be mended-

the anaconda snake of haulers, cherry-pickers, pick-up trucks,

campers, SUV’s and convertibles

slowly suffocating Periwinkle Way won’t relax,

no space appears between the vehicles:

“the back way on Gulf Drive” your only escape,

like a beaten animal, you make a right turn.