Florida
BY MAUREEN SEATON
The dead rattle around in their underwater gear, praying,
debating—it’s true, they link up in conga lines, assist
each other at births, smile toothless under black light. I love
them. I cannot love them enough. If I were to bring each one
surfside and pump them all back to life, they would surround
me like a swell of sailors, singing way-aye, blow the man down.
One autumn we were on 14th Street back North and you’d
forgotten your jacket. You said, I have two dollars to my name
and I’m going to buy myself a jacket, and you went into a store and
came out with a nice one. How did you do things like that?
There’s a skeleton in the riptide. The storm’s back wall blew
the letters off the Diane Motel. I’d been hiding in the eye and
thought: Damn, what will happen to the D? Now I’m heading
away from Tampa and Kissimmee. An old man hails a circus
train beside a cart of oranges. Oranges rule this state. They
control legislation and roll around like pointless politicians.
I once saw human sperm defrosting under a microscope,
just a drop of tadpoles, bumping hilariously into one another.
