Two Poems
by Laura Deily
Art Deco, Miami Beach
As you stroll along Ocean Drive,
hugged by a row of Royal palms,
women in hot-pink zebra unitards,
open-air cafès, and a Bacardi-swilling bachelor party,
pause to notice the way hotels rise before you like ziggurats.
The whimsical seascape reliefs adorning
their stepped façades are there to remind you
that you are on vacation, drunk,
and should invest in that sparkly, thonged bikini
you saw in the last gift shop window.
Take note that the bejeweled
twenty-foot sign that thrusts up the middle
of the Breakwater Hotel is NOT a phallic symbol.
Nor is the one on the Colony Hotel.
These architectural gems were conceived
from a mixture of streamlined industrialism,
King Tut's tomb, and the French.
They are symbols of Depression-era
optimism, much like the forty-eight person
Hummer limo that throbs beside you in the street.
A few blocks down, you will find the Clevelander Hotel.
Step around the dog clutching a bucket
of dollar bills in its mouth and go inside,
where you will be transported
into an episode of The Jetsons.
This is an example of MiMo style,
a result of affluence, spaceships, and the fifties.
It is not really art deco, but no one cares.
Sit at the bar. Smile inappropriately at the young
spring breaker standing across the room.
He will buy you another mai tai in three minutes.
While you wait, admire the kidney-shaped pool,
glimmering like curaçao, and the sand, white as cocaine.
Sixteenth Century Timucuan Skeleton, St. Augustine, Florida
Late December, two days after our Lord's birth, I woke early,
drank a cup of cacina tea with my wife, letting the heat redden our lips,
and went to piss in the tall grass. Frost dusted everything.
I worried about our crops. As I walked back, my arm tingled.
My chest clenched. The air smelled like citrus. I fell.
A crow pecked the ground nearby. My eyes swelled into fat grapes.
The graveyard was arranged like a honeycomb. It took six men
to dig a hole deep enough, due to the frost. They laid me in my box,
facing east, arms crossed on my chest. Clumps of dirt rained steadily,
then stopped. There was no heaven, no hell. Just darkness.
And ants. Once the skin was cleaned from my bones,
I hardened like clay. I mostly meditated. Or thought of the way
my wife's neck tensed when she was angry. I missed hunting fish.
The coffin dissolved. Roots, like albino fingers, grew down to meet me.
Time curved in on itself. One day, the ground shook.
A hard edge cut through the earth like a scythe, striking my rib.
Light hit my eye socket. A blanched face peered into my grave.
The man yelped, threw his shovel in the air, and kissed my forehead.
When he brought me up, I saw my village had become an orange grove.
Finally, I thought, the resurrection, as Friar Antonio promised!
There were no trumpets or glowing children, like in the pictures.
Sun-hatted apostles raised the others buried around me.
Now, families come to stare. They point funny black boxes at us
that flash suddenly, like dying stars. Wingless cherubs stand on their toes,
whine, some cry. We are a sight. It's All Souls' Day, every day.
In the evening, heavy-footed angels darken the small suns
that buzz overhead. I am still waiting for the clap of hooves,
for the sky to unfurl like an infinite orange blossom.
Laura Deily is an MFA candidate at the University of Florida, where she also teaches writing. Her poems appear in Prick of the Spindle and Breakwater Review. She is originally from Boston, Massachusetts.