On the north tip of Bahia Banderas
there is a point with long crescent beaches
called ***** de Mita, where villas loom
behind massed manzanillas, where
half-asleep guards with sleepy machine guns
slump on plastic chairs under hibiscus
beyond the driftwood that marks the high tide.

There, on a bed, in this cabana, where
I know the pelicans, the names of the waves
and the sound your feet make on the sand, when
it's too hot beneath fluttering canvas
to do more than stretch out, as if on the rack,
staked under the sun and slathered with honey,
eye-lids sewed open, awaiting the army
of fire-ants....
                     except your feet are too perfect
for me to be eaten by ants,
toe-nails too pink, crazy sand blooms
on your wet shoulder blades: O instead,
I'll sit up and stare at your nose.
I've seen it before on a totem pole
in Chapultepec Park: inscrutable Aztec,
cempazuchitl, I've been waiting for you
to devour my heart.