Bellaire Drive, August 29 2006

The listing shrimper's skiff cast up at the curb,
athwart the long brown lawn where once
shrimp shells and heads met their end
among brown bottles and spice-stained newspaper:
a reminder in ruin of all that was lost when the lake
drowned the worlds of shrimpers and boilers alike.

From now each steaming shrimp I take from the plate
will carry a bitter taste, be seasoned by this vision
of a life as old and close to the earth as an oak
washed away, the bones of boats and homes
to be carted off at last to some upland dump
where seagulls skirl and whirl far from the water.

Poetry Poem New Orleans Hurricane Katrina