Convalescence Island

He flung the rope to me

And pulled another through the rigging,

Relishing the salty mist and seafood scents.

He smiled like a patient father

As I fumbled knots and stumbled over coils.

He received this favor once,

Once before when love had torn him open.

Once an older man showed him the route

Across the ocean, down southern coastlines

To the island where men retreat to lick their wounds

Until they find their feet and stand stronger.

You learn to love the smell of heavy rot.

You lose your shoes to yielding sand,

The hot and soft embrace of being lost

Aside a certain escape of sea.

You scrape the wood into the roughest planks

And lean them on each other for a temporary stay,

A field of flimsy sheds

About the beds of coconut tree leaves.

There's hidden in the bushes past the shacks

A stash of bottles,

Medicine for sick and battered men,

Painkillers for hearts to clot and heal.

It takes a slab of shells from eaten crabs

And countless days beneath the clearest blue

Before you start to realize

The tourists are residents now

Upon the island where men retreat to eat their wounds

Until the wounds become all that they are.

- 2/17/26