The Unlearning Sufferer (For My Fisherman Friend) Poem by RIC BASTASA

this place had
given me more pains
that joys

i have measured it
carefully
with my broken heart

here i am always mending
like a fisherman who has
never learned
about his nets

i must be foolish
being back and nurture
these pains
like a rotten tomato

somehow i must rise from
all these falls
i must transcend these
limitations

under the coconut trees
i watch the sea
all wide and blue and
murmuring the sonorous sounds
of its repetitions

soon a coconut may fall
and hit me dead
but it does not really
matter anymore