Locked in the garden without language, a dark skinned woman enters to sweep debris from the sand and gravel. I am sitting, with the resident dogs at my feet, watching a rat navigate a bending branch and iron grillwork. Men appear, casting lines into the surf. Solitary, golden-haired girls arrive, then boys. In the dappled light under trees in a public space between hotels, women hush their babies. Boys soothe ponies for hire, adjusting red leather harnesses. My rat incites territorial squawks from the snowy parrot.
Donald Wellman | Mudlark No. 34 |