Florida Drifter 1975 - Journal Poetry

1975

Past midnight
January
1975
26 hours from Boston
Wintah far north__
Florida
Palm Beach
Crashing on a Golf course
The 17th green
Lay on a white cotton sheet
Fall asleep
Under the palm trees and a full moon
Far from Wintah___
Before dawn
Water on my face
Not rain
A greens sprinkler
To the west night
To the east the dawn
Around me
Flamingoes
Not plastic
Pink flamingoes
On a golf course
On a hot swampy morning
Far from Wintah__
Rub my eyes
Not a dream
Florida
Water everywhere
The Gulf Stream and the Everglades
Sharks Alligators Flamingos
Golf courses on the coastal dry land
Roads crossing the Sea of Grass
Old US1
North to South
Linking
Fort Kent, Maine to Key West
Now
Palm Beach
Warm. Not Cold. Going to sleep__
Dreaming of Florida
From before the snowbirds
Before the explorers
Before the slavers
Before Dixie Highway
Before A1A
Before 1-95__
Better no one had never come
No French, no Spanish, no English, no Cubans, No Yankees, No Rebs No gringos
Only flamingos, sharks, alligators, deserted beaches and Seminoles
Only Bimini and Pa-hay-Okee, the eternal Sea of Grass__
But not today
Not this fine morning
January 12, 1975
Me
22 years old
I'm in Florida
I gather my things
On the 17th Green
Cuban grounds men beginning the day
A half hour after the dawn
I don't belong here
On the 17th green__
I walk to the interstate
I-95
Stick out my thumb
With luck Miami Beach by noon
Only two or three hours away
An Oldsmobile 88 stops
Tell the driver
“South, I’m going south.”
Earle to Miami
Me too
Glad to be in his car
And away from Wintah
Away we go
WRBD-FM on the radio
Miami Soul Stevie Wonder's Boogie On Reggae Woman"
80 mph
Flying down the flat highway
Flat swamp as far as the eye can see
The Everglades
The Sea of Grass__
Make Miami Beach by 10
Get
A room at the Leslie
On Collins Avenue
Room 201
$15/night
Art Deco colors
Across from the Gulf Stream___
In the lobby
A blind piano tuner
Playing ‘ROUND MIDNIGHT’

Hit the beach
Swim far out
No sharks
Only fishing boats out on the Gulf Stream__
That afternoon at the Club Deuce
Gordon Lightfoot's "Sundown" on the juke box
Meet an older woman
Wisha
Almost three times my age
59
Attractive, fit, slim
Wisha a gin tonic
Me too
Only doubles
Wisha
Blonde thin
Not wrinkle on her skin
I breathe the nape of her neck
Yves Saint Laurent's Opium
Her Fountain of Youth
The Deuce's eternal night__
Sun goes down
Woman and man retire to her apartment
On 35th Street
17th floor overlooking Biscayne Bay
Windows open to the breeze
Curtains floating from the window
The scent of the sea same as me
In bed
Wisha cries out ‘deeper deeper.’
Like a XXX Tuesday Weld
Then again and again
Sunset to midnight
And again and again__
At dawn
Wisha offered a 50
I took the half-yard
And walk to the Deuce
Open 24/7__
Feeling lucky
I win at eight ball
Two Busch beers
Go back to the Leslie
Crash on the bed
To the murmur of morning traffic on Collins Avenue
With
A date to meet Wisha at noon __
Wake up
11:15
A late breakfast
Bacon and eggs
At Wolfies
Break the fifty
A quick plunge in the luke warm ocean
Back to Room 201
No shower wearing the scent of the sea__
In the torpid lobby
Listen to the blind man play
Cannonball Adderly's Something Else
His name Old Bill__
At noon
A gleaming white Cadillac convertible
At the curb
Wisha slides to the passenger side
"You drive."___
Out to the Everglades
On US 41
Top down
90 mph
Sun banging down
"Don't You Worry 'bout a Thing" on
Gators howling in the swamp
The empty road
The highest point for miles
No off roads
No where to stop
No Flamingos
Only gators
A white Cadillac convertible and a blonde woman
Wisha my Tuesday Weld__
Wisha don’t even know my name
She says one word
“Here.”
We do it
In the back of the Cadillac
On the shoulder of US 41
Not naked
Jeans half mast
To my knees
Her dress above her waist__
Florida sun so close to the Everglades
"Wisha."
I whisper her name
Alligators roar like drowning dogs
From the Sea of Grass
From the back of the Cadillac
And Wisha screams
I moan
I love Florida
It ain’t cold
It ain't Boston
It ain't wintah
I’m not staying here
In a week
I’ll headed to California
Santa Barbara
To be with Sheri
23
Same as me
But not until Florida and Wisha are through with me
Later rather than sooner
Near naked in a white Cadillac
With the gators roaring from the Sea of Grass And wintah far to the north__

Enemies of the State - The Fanjuls of Florida

The Seminoles called the vast tropical wetlands of Southern Florida Pa-hay-okee. The swamps atop the limestone plateau have been inhabited from 10,000BC, however the recent predation of Man threatened to destroy the Grassy Waters.

Green algae covers the waterways and coastal shores with a thick slime.

The 2013 outbreak was bad.

The 2016 bloom has been worse.

The Everglades have suffered with the expansion of housing into the once impenetrable swamps. The State of Florida receives about $700 million in taxes from real estate transactions and by law a third of this sum was earmarked for the rehabilitation of Everglades, instead the Republican government has diverted the funds to pay off budget shortcomings, as explained by wikipedia in 2008, the State of Florida agreed to buy U.S. Sugar and all of its manufacturing and production facilities for an estimated $1.7 billion. Florida officials indicated they intended to allow U.S. Sugar to process for six more years before dismissing its employees and dismantling the plant. The area, which includes 187,000 acres (760 km2) of land, would then be rehabilitated and water flow from Lake Okeechobee would be restored. In November 2008, the agreement was revised to offer $1.34 billion, allowing sugar mills in Clewiston to remain in production. Critics of the revised plan say that it ensures sugarcane will be grown in the Everglades for at least another decade. Further research is being done to address the continuing production of sugarcane in the Everglades to minimize phosphorus runoff.

Easy to blame the GOP, however the main criminals are the Fanjuls Brothers, whose sugar plantations cover a good percentage of the wetlands, leading to massive runoff of fertilizer during the rainy season. The Cuban-born brothers are big spenders on politics, influencing state and federal legislatures to support their exploitation of the Everglades and their workers.

They have also bought the Press.

The Fanjuls are never mentioned in articles about the green slime.

But what else can you expect for capitalism?

The truth.

Which is that 'we' also are part of the problem with our lawns, cars, and swimming pools and shit.

Despite all our damage the Everglades remain magic.

Nothing better than a canoe trip in them either.

Baby gators, birds, and turtles.

I love them.