Poem: When Charity Began Up-River

Long gone Sundays...green razor-leaves and purple blossoms...white-shirted in the morning mist...too young to know the
secrets of the black river...following the old trail brown and bare-footed...with no murmur but the west wind's over me...
brown eyes looking North...impatient for tomorrow...and touching and being touched by everything around me...among
wild cocoa flowers...jewel centred frangipani...outside the wooden windowed church...unsure of whispers in the morning sun
light...as ladies in white head cloths...hint at orange blossom scented sins by others...and hold their heads high...Believing
in the wisdom of anyone two years older than me...not knowing we are all beginners...and those who do not have eyes to see
and ears to hear...have nothing to teach anyone...Down the road the zinc roofed market shed...sheltering spreaded sacks...
covered with mottled mangoes...green, yellow, orange, and scarlet peppers...over-looked by gold earringed and gold
toothed gravel voiced ladies...playing tropical patience...with carillas and cashews for cards...Where are they all now?...these
yesterday people...my eyes first saw...and my ears first heard?...Where are they all... these yesterday things...that painted my
Pomeroon pictures with a thousand burning colours?...Where are they now...and all the long gone Sundays...when Charity
began up-river.................? Quester.