You're very aware of the sky and the water in the islands.
The weather. You're out there in it, so to speak.
Attire is casual. Shorts and T-shirts, or gook shirts.
Flip-flops. Of course, I already wore Birkenstock sandals.
Go to Mallory Square at sunset and stare at the hippie chicks.
No bras, dirty feet. Old Town reminded me of the French Quarter,
or Greenwich Village. Little Five Points in Atlanta. A wino
with a mixed-breed dog on a leash. Were roosters a problem?
I don't remember. I know a guy had a tropical bird for tourists to get
their picture taken with. I remember a bougainvillea vine growing up
in a royal poinciana tree. No, that was next trip, on Greene Street, across from
Captain Tony's Saloon, the site of the original Sloppy Joe's. On the way down
I ate at a restaurant on Summerland Key that had stone crab legs on the seafood platter.
Drawn butter. But the oysters were from Apalachicola. Where would the stone crabs
be from? Everglades City? There's a shrimp called Key West Pink. And of course
langusta, or spiny lobster. The fish of the day might be grouper.
The idea of order in Key West is different.
Wallace Stevens got in a fistfight with Hemingway.
Broke his hand. I wasn't that bad.
I wasn't anything to anyone.
I was aiee, the phantom.
It's 4:00 a m. I'm up,
writing poems.
No one will see.
My husband's secret life.
He was crazy. Daft. Balmy.
When I wrote a column for Old Sparky
I called it "Balmy Breezes." The banner had a picture of
a printing press that looked like the electric chair at Raiford.

Are you our custodian? Do you have a secret life?
Not anymore I don't, lady. I have been outed.
Out yourself. They're going to find out anyway.
Sooner or later. It can't be hidden and it won't go away.
Write poems no one will see about 20 years ago. Past glory.
Is this memory or imagination? How would one know?