Everglades Poems

Everglades 1

the heron soars
the ibis perches

the gator croaks

and all around is

grass, water, wind

and the relentless sun

Everglades 2

there is a rightness to the swamp

like cake on your birthday

or calling your mother on Mother's Day

a harmony

and yet that balance is precarious

fragile

you can smell it in the muck

sense it in the bald cypress

see it in the gator's recalcitrance

fleeting

fleeing Man's avarice

Everglades 3

Rich

like the smell of sex or compost

like the feel of mulch or dried beans

like the taste of a perfect cheeseburger

like the sound of harmonies

what is it?

It's life.

Everywhere.

Everglades 4

Improperly maligned

the gator lies sunning

motionless, totemic

a primordial god made flesh

it sighs, releasing heat

insouciant to the spectators

serene in its purpose

and in its place

it is home

it belongs.