Free A Shadow in Yucatan by Philippa Rees

The Beauty Parlour, Coconut
Grove .
    All day the
cycles swing around the window, the tanned legs flattered by the
double glass then arrested...Ratchets buzz impatient..
The slow generator arbitrates...
The green light frees the traffic’s undertow.
    Reflected
twice, the lightweight English Raleighs, gears, toe-clips, nudge
the dryers against the far white wall.
Wink and seduce the gap-toothed rubber plant, skewer Mrs. Sklayne
at her pedicure, with spokes.
    ‘ Not too short at
back...mind the kiss curl’s at the side...let me remove my
spectacles…’
    ‘ Vogue or Harpers,
take ya pick?
Will y’ave coffee, chocolate or iced milk?’
    Stephanie works
fast, (she’s real nice Steph ...)
not smart y’hear, but steady, plain but clean;
her fair-isle sweater under the gingham darned at the elbow
    'But the ankles, it’s
a shame, a shade too thick.
She’s been with us, let’s see...goin on three years and as I
recall, never a day missed...
Quiet with the customers, never chatty...that sort leave..
Ten fifty altogether...have a nice day...’
    ‘ Where the hell’s
that cheeseburger?
‘I jus gotta have a cigarette’

    *****

    ‘ Are you early lunch
or late?’
    Stephanie
shrugs, her wide mouth full of pins.
She fixes the bangs, sprays and dusts the neck... powder tin is
empty...
    ‘ Drugstore’ll be
crowded’
    ‘ I’ll eat my apple
in the park’
    ‘ Yeah? Well suit
y’self. I’m blowin. Gotta rip.’

    *****

    The tide is
out, the grass worn summer-thin.
The cymbal-shakin Hare Krishna set have gone to swim.
The wind is blowin west, there ain’t one jib, the burgees up the
masts a yelpin din...
The pelicans have gone.
    ‘ Christ I feel
sick!’
    Wally’s in his
hammock with his kids,
his squint son, bored with bark, with woodlice, and the tethered
tree.
His daughter sunk in her talcum sleep is stroked...
The monocle of light, now focussed, flames her hair, it lifts, it
falls, it curves, conceals...
Her open nectar-mouth, now shaded, breathes.
    He peers
between his knees into the dust
unable to distinguish screw from seed...
He sifts with fingers, looks beneath his thigh,
investigates the folds of sock, and sighs...
    Balanced on one
palm he rolls erect and goes to pull a rush leaf by the
hedge,
splits it with his neat sharp teeth,
curves length along an easy tongue...
Binds his bifocal frames with green, and sits back down.
    Now he takes up
and tunes a steel banjo.
His hands, with nails kept short, are competent and quick.
They guide the dolphin sounds through hoops of tree; he bends, he
turns, harks with ear inclined...
It reaches pitch. It thrums and calls...he seldom plays,
he keeps it tuned, in case.
    He’s come far,
has Wally, in the years, come March, since Annie rode away astride
a pillion, arms around her black...OK her darkie...(Nigger if
y’like)
Shacked up in Oregon...he isn’t sure. She does not often
write.
The kids, the bike, banjo, all-purpose knife,
comprise his got-together, self-sufficient life.
    ‘ I ain’t
sold’
    Stephanie’s
doubts confuse, her hopes weave round and round.
She’s walking straight, though slowly, on the shore
queasy as that oil slick on the sand
    ‘ Tar barrels, fish
and quarrelling gulls sure don’t help me stomach varnish, acetone
and cream...
His small girl needs a mama, that’s for sure...
I’d bake us pizza, we could cut cookies..
    ‘ I’m gonna be
sick !’

    Wally
stops.
He knows the scene.
    Man, that’s too
much!
That girl beyond the saw grass...she’s alone...
and why she’s bending down so low?
    Her back convulses, shows its spine, and
spews...
The gulls come circling...
peck, startled, skid the retch recoil,
relentless pump, the thud .
    She’s fallen on her
knees...no she gets up...
she’s goin to splash her face in curvin brine.
    Discards her
sandals, rinses and then spits...She spits twice more.
Enjoys the tang of salt, the clear clean sting of salt, of salt, of
salt...
A welling unimpeded view of everything.
    ‘ Yer pregnant