Paul Feldwick
Ovid at Miami Beach
From the plate glass of his air-conditioned penthouse, Jove
spotted Juanita’s brown skin, her white bikini
crossing the empty beach, trailing her noon shadow
behind her like a fat black crab.
He took her in the shape of a wave,
a muscular breaker that snatched her breath
and made her scream.
In July the Lifeguard’s little tower
is empty. Cabs, the sun-lounger guy,
dropped the greasy towels he was collecting
and ran into the surf.
It was as warm as soup, and as thick. Jove,
tetchy at the interruption, twisted
a rope of weed around Carlos’ bare ankle. And,
where the sand slopes sharply, dragged him down
to Neptune’s glaucous lower lobby level.
But Juno, taking pity, stretched
his broad nose into a flat shovel, his muscled thighs
into corrugated iron tracks. Now, each morning,
he scours the sand’s edge free of weed,
Coke cans, condoms, as far north as Bal Harbour.
And Juanita - weightless and delicate as in life -
her arms spread into biplane wings,
buzzes the length of South Beach all afternoon,
trailing a banner: Visit Joe’s Stone Crab.
Page(s) 35
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