Unsettled

So consider an unsettled island. Inside – the unflattened and unsugared fields; inside – a tegareg sprawl of roots and canopies,

inside – the tall sentries of bloodwood and yoke-wood and sweet-wood,

of dog-wood, of bullet trees so hard they will one day splinter cutlasses,

will one day swing low the carcasses of slaves; inside – a crawling brawl of vines, unseemly flowers that blossom from their spines;

inside – the leh-guh orchids and labrishing hibiscuses that throw raucous syllables at crows whose heads are red as annattos; inside – malarial mosquitoes that rise from stagnant ponds; inside – a green humidity thick as mud;

inside – the stinging spurge, the nightshades, the Madame Fates;

inside – spiders, gnats and bees, wasps and lice and fleas; inside –

the dengue, the hookworm, the heat and botheration; unchecked macka

13