sunburnt palm trees

Ah, you’ve landed in the place to be! A place for continuous reinvention, alive with the brutal but freeing fact: no one knowing a before. Blazing skies, gleaming off ripples from blue waters - reflecting a life of the creator. unknown, for Now. A place brimming with its own agency, even the wild life forget where they belong. Driven out by the consumption of another, through their own wants under the guise of needs. My own alabaster skin could reflect an omen of what’s to come: through sunburns, dulled away, sore to the touch, every layer of skin peeling cementing itself, here to stay. 

Naming each hurricane a new life, a new season, whipped into existence by dizzying wind. A life feeling so fresh so easily rained upon with what could’ve been mistaken for prosperity - turned out to be the middle of the eye. Entranced by a deceiving calm, one not afraid or ashamed to linger in; relishing in the swells of a storm closing in on the outside, but never fully reaching in. Through this, a need to be spun out, to be pulled limb from limb into rebirth. Found in the eye of the next, settling in, waiting for the break away. 

Not surprised to find myself thrown toward the sea, being rolled under the tide from a wave that crashes with such intensity heads roll back in wonder. “What did I do?” to meet it with the same force - a challenge. The bodies natural need to fight for survival, but the minds unwillingness to do so. Caught in the riptide despite the warnings. Without blaming this place, the warnings were so easily missed, a wanting, really. The bluest sky keeping up the allure of uncharted lands. Lands waiting to be explored by the most feeble minded. Even the brightest warning couldn’t stand against what has been curated. 

A new found solace in the cloudy skies that bring a steady rain, no longer in a state of misleading sunshine. A slate of gray that comes and washes away an essence deep in belonging, now forced with a starting over. An offering so bright and sleek, it could be mistaken for the sun; afraid that to grab is to burn. So it’s kept near, playing with the idea of holding it so close that it tears through skin and blisters the notions of before. Just when the courage builds up, brave enough to figure out if this new thing will burn, or slip away - clouds clear way, bringing forth newness that is inescapable; repeatable. 

A dryness so severe, complete with its own burning, a true inescapable burning. No prawn shade is safe from stagnant - suffocating - heat that surrounds even the most joyous smile. Causing it to slip and sit with recognition of a mirage we are all basking in, for the sake of hopeful songs that birds sing; within this new state of being. Resembling dried up golf courses that feel redeemable by a false sense of water caused by sprinklers. And that notion is enough for some, and for others the mirage is enough. 

So when winter floats in, sometimes a season just for name sake. The body lingers with nausea from home sickness. Though which home, i’m unsure. Between the familiar winter smell that twirls in the air, a true deep smell of winter or in the sun that I’ve let take me more times than I am proud to admit. The grip for this is different, tighter than anything felt before. A true promise of escape from the never ending blue that has lodged itself, thumbs pressed hard into my unwilling eyes. Escape from a heat so deep I feel it each time a cool wind passes through me - allowing a polar of opposites to exist in this one frame, able to experience a true belonging through this tethered dichotomy. 

And when spring emerges through blossoms, once unable to exist anywhere else, this return feels universal. Releasing struggle, easily succumbing to this reborn space each time its generous enough to show itself. Two homes fully merging as one - rejuvenating those who embrace the welcoming breeze with open arms through a deep inhale, softly settling with an exhale. Ready to repeat the misguided paths with new eyes, expecting the same results. The only solace is an ever changing color of green, that has settled into fragmented spaces of the soul - a change stable enough to keep grounded, rooted in the familiarity of this specific way. 

Sunburnt palm trees understand they have to withstand weather, hell bent backward. Sunburnt palm trees understand they have to withstand the hopes of those that try to create something that isn’t there. False prayers under sunburnt palm trees, of a sun and blue skies so easily mistaken for a chance at a new life. A new way of being; coming from shouts of a lawed land hidden behind a curtain of self-imagined lawlessness.