Florida blind

I look outside

Now that we have been back from Florida for two weeks

And I am having a hard time seeing what is here

But it's not brain fog . . .

I'm squinting through a projection of palm trees and stucco malls,

And white, pink and pale-blue high-rises

Gated communities, golf courses

Beaches adorned with barely dressed women,

Boulevards that you could land a small plane on, on Sundays.

This is not my cataracts,

This is not a migraine.

This is not insomnia

This is me trying to get all the way home.

My clothes are a different color here, darker, thicker, warmer.

My thoughts are no longer just my thoughts,

Whereas in Florida my thoughts were like

Exhausted birds who made a wrong turn

Searching for a roost

Or anything that looks familiar.

Here I think something

And it immediately flies free

And joins other birds of the same feather.

What I am saying is,

The eyes of my brain are confused.

Where is the ocean? It used to be so close.

Where is the random siren,

Where is the distant train whistle

Where is the

Never-repeating haughty mockingbird

Over the broken record of the mourning dove?

Where is the beeless hibiscus?

The little dogs with pink collars,

Where are all people of color

Doing all the essential work

That keeps the infrastructure humming

For the burgeoning population of retirees?

Where is the white attenuated long-billed heron

Heading for the Indian River Lagoon?

Where are the rich people's boats

Cruising back and forth in the waterway,

Seeing who can make the biggest wake?

All I see when I look out my window

If I really focus,

Is my backyard

And an opening in the stone wall

Inviting me to walk in the field

That I can barely make out

Because my brain is still in transit

Throwing white, yellow and indigo t-shirts out the window.

And empty tubes of sunscreen.