Heat beats on sun bleached sidewalks. Vines and bougainvillea, purple-fuchsia-yellow, twine over tall white conch houses and shotgun shacks. In the air, a bouquet of marijuana and sea salt piques the senses. Distant sounds of waves and djembe drums, staccato syncopation, smooth meditative, lull the brain into the rhythm that is Key West. I meander up and down streets looking for a place to live. Don’t need much. All I own is a backpack containing cut off jeans, a blue work shirt with sleeves ripped out, a notebook, some pens and my copy of Be Here Now by Ram Dass. I am living this book. All I want to do is be the heat and write. I find a “for rent” sign in front of a  white row house on Duval Street across from Big Mamma’s Music Club and rent it. There’s a kitchen table, two chairs and a loft bed made from a shrimp boat door. I drop my back pack in a corner, sit down on the floor and write a story about Jesus juggling oranges on Malory pier at sunset, and a poem about Duval Street. A warm peace falls over me. There is no place else I wish to be, nothing else I wish to be doing.

gratitude
for simple plesures
colors blend
like melting crayons
on a wine bottle