South Portugal

We stand on the Algarve cliffs looking out at the Atlantic.
My eyes are drawn far up and over the curve of the water,
and I have that strong sensation of homesickness,
for a place that is not my home.

The ocean is a conjurer of yearning,
and I am a paperback its waves leaf through.

My plot could be thicker, my lacunae narrower,
but I stand nonetheless,
with a mist of praise on my lips,
and watch the sun ascend through a burnt-orange brine,
while silver wisps of cloud court the morning,
and the mouths of yellow sea daisies open in devotion.

North, from the coast to the sheltered valleys of the barrocal,
the olive trees are nourishing themselves, preparing to bloom.
The citrus trees have seasoned, the roadsides are dotted
with wooden crates holding mesh bags, bulging with oranges,
lemons, you can pick from the car. Farther up the serra
are carob, almond, stone pine, and cork oak.

On a hill, cows graze beside a fallen castle, vines twine
over stone and moss-ruined mortar. Everything
but the Azores ivy is given over to gravity.

We drive through villages, walk their mazes of tiled alleys,
enter their sandstone chapels and vaulted churches —
much of the sacred imagery is lost on me.
But I am a tourist with vacationing eyes,
what do I know about the woman whose head is bowed?
whose hands are cupped in supplication, whose very body,
before the dark carving of Christ, is a depiction of prayer.

In the town squares are markets. We buy figs and fresh almonds;
sample port, red, tawny, ruby; we eat monkfish, cataplana
with cod and cockles, the lamb stew is questionable, but the sea bass
was caught this morning, and the wine is cheap and good.

I want to listen to Fado, that profoundly melancholic music
peculiar to Portugal. It would have paired well with the stew;
as would have the Neil Diamond impersonator in Albufeira.

Always, there are gothic cathedrals, soaring pointed arches,
flamboyant rose windows held in webs of stone tracery,
and towering belfries, where white storks copulate,
their considerable joys sound like faraway machine-gun fire.

We stroll the dark cloisters, enter the airless naves,
the apses, beyond decorative, yawn with gold-leaf opulence;
lavish statues, extravagant knotwork, the busts, the figurines,
altogether, none so rich as the deep ochre cliffs,
the sea, the sand, the sun, to where we’ll return.