Iguana Friend

     for Jorge

Green gilled, you sit as if a sun
could warm you here in some
back-alley bar, as a strange song
slowly sips just beyond
that soulful slithering tail,

the luster of it all dulled
though the afternoon, when you find
all there is to look forward to
is the clink of ice into another glass
and the distant heat of a flickering bulb.

God damn the years – fated, waiting
for the interminable crawl southward
until the fucking sign says:
“Highway 1, Begins, Mile 0” – that’s zero
nowhere – it doesn’t begin, it ends

right there on Whitehead, past
the Green Parrot, past the Kapok tree,
past the courthouse, half-a-block
and you dig in your claws because:
“By God I’m here, right here, the beginning…”

And the movie ends, Cinema Tropical,
its bright lights shine on Duval crawlers
and yeah, Parrotheads, Buffet’s so cliché
he’s come back home. So finish your drink
Iguana friend and then slide on.