Imagining An Island
To The South
Marianne Szlyk
In my future, green drenches the air.
Live oak and palmetto
block out sun and sky.
I can smell the color clinging
to these leaves. On the breeze
salt trickles through.
I taste salt water taffy: sea green,
dove gray, and hot pink, the same colors
I know from up north.
Beyond the leaves, waves slap the beach.
Seagulls wheel above the rocks;
sandpipers strut on damp sand.
I feel summer coming before spring.
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