From 'the Green Flash' X Poem by Morgan Michaels

It was their first day at Baie Des Palmes. They rented a moke at the airport and were soon speeding along the perilous road to the far end of the isle. Rumbling down the long driveway, the moke churned up a wake of red dust, because, as Fannie later said, the season had been dry. They arrived with one bag too many apiece, they saw, suddenly aware of the bags' united bulk within the confines of the small room. It wasn't French. In the tropics, the French ordinarily managed to achieve the most with the least. In fact, they practically lived in their skivvies, thought Billy, his heart brimming with admiration for a nation's deshabille. Their own surplus, it must be said, was pretty New York. But they got over it, unpacked and headed out into the still-bright sunlight.

Cal and Tom had settled in and were struggling to relax. That there was nothing to do made relaxation harder than it might be, elsewise. They'd arrived the day before from Saba, where they planned to some day retire. Tom liked Saba because, like his mother, it had once been Dutch, though Cal sometimes thought it dull, for the same reason. They found them on their porch, sitting at a small, round table, its top bristling with empties. When not staring at the bay, Calvin read in a paperback. With his elbows, Tom anchored down a copy of US News And World Report, that way preventing wind-flutter.

'Guys'!

'Why, look whose here'!

It was a happy reunion. Tom and Cal stood up, deposto. Everyone laughed, shook hands, talked at once and swore nobody'd changed. It was only a year, after all. When they sat down. Billy noticed the news rag.

'Tom', put that away', he jested, pointing to the journal.

'You're on vacation! It doesn't matter what happens in Slovakia, or what the temperature in Miami is'.

Tom, maybe the nicest man on earth, laughed and closed the
journal obligingly.