The morning air withholds
its hint of what the day will be.
And so I wait and watch
beneath the gumbo limbo tree.
By afternoon the clouds
are alabaster bales of cotton.
They conjure up my youth,
and memories I had forgotten.
Distant thunder looms.
A breeze stirs a cabbage palm.
The rattle of a frond
predicts an ending to the calm.
Lightning splits the sky
amid a gray and restless wind.
So I retreat to home,
to shelter and the storm within.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem