Coconut Cream Cocktail Hour

Coconut Cream Cocktail Hour

A fleet of clouds gathers offshore
Like Spanish galleons
But crystal blue sky powder
Rules the beach with cool breezes
As days turn into years
And Cozumel coconut cream pie
Melts in my heart like memories in the afternoon
Of when I was young and foolhardy enough
To tempt fate
By swimming far out to sea
On cold windswept beachcombers
Of the Maine beach
Daring Poseidon to show his wrath
But was spared and thankfully lived to tell the tale

As the memory of Neptune’s mercy
Found me in Florida
Emboldened to challenge him once more
When the sea alert was red
And I let the stormy waves thrash me
Like a piece of driftwood
Or a whale desirous of beaching
But once more was spared
From the riptide
And drove off very much alive
With body unbroken

With daredevil days long past
Tomorrow will be another day
The tides will wax and ebb
Lovers will quarrel, babies will be born,
And people will die
Traffic will inch on congested highways
The mad pageant of life will unfold
Like a tragic Shakespearean play
With children emerging into forlorn lives
Refugees enter displaced person camps
Transient souls transmigrate to Hades
But cumulus haunts the horizon
Like an Iberian Armada
Sailing for the Gibraltar
Of my heart