On this lush island,
Suitcases unpacked,
We trade our pallid Greenwich fogs
And stinging coastal mists
For drenching,
Rainbowed cascades
Under which we play
And slake feral thirst.

We tangle in solandra vines,
Skin saturated
In tropical deluge
Yet aflame
With touch sparked
Chain lightning.

Even the night's deepest thunder
Can't suppress desperate whispers
Wordlessly invoking
Downpours of refreshment
While passions conflagrate
On the inferno edge
Of satisfaction.

As tongues of lava steam the sea,
So incompletely quenched
Flow our molten urges.

Never know when
Each drink from you
Will be my last -
For an evening
Or a weekend,
Six, seven months
Or forever.

In the bliss of day one,
Abundant torrents churn
Their afterglow music
Across the valley floor
Or in cliff-diving veils,

Only to dissipate,
Vacating sere stone beds
As your silence thickens
And day infinity
Dawns with a desert's sun.

A scorched, pewter sky
Dusted with dessicated cirrus
Wedges Annapurna and Dhaulagiri,
Whose serrated lofts
Banish all save for
An eagle's lonely drift
On the waterless wind.

Other nomads traverse
This muted landscape,
Offer casks of no appeal
To too many takers
At too great a cost.

Though there is drink,
Drink everywhere,
I choose thirst,
Having acclimatized
To the austere,
Tenuous beauty

In the monochrome of parched earth,
In the dissonance of syl nyan,
In the soaring arc of a condor,

In the remoteness of you,

In waiting.

Readers' Notes: 'Syl nyan' are Tibetan ceremonial cymbals. Blame/credit the Forum 'documentaries' thread for triggering this virtual trek.