Praying mantis on screen
   canoes prowl reef in early morning sun
   as it flashes on the rhythmic fall of weed cutter's cutlass blade
   everybody's got something to sell besides the obvious dollars and dope
   aloe rub, starfish, vegetable patties, braid your hair miss and bush doctor cures
   sudden angry eruption between aloe peddler and man with property to protect
   muscular security guard with truncheon of twisted wire
   "kiss my blood clot" she hisses and they're enemies for life
   in the beach front bar they're playing reggae versions of Jim Reeves' Greatest Hits
   the waitress sings along, eyes focused dreamily on that sentimental world
   and there's DANCING in PARADISE...
  
   blue green ship in turquoise bay
   swollen bauxite-red river rushing
   stream rising from feathered bamboo hills
   tracks once paved now falling away into deep lush valleys
   and the farmed-out road contracts pass through so many hands
   the print erodes with the weather-worn blacktop
   and the jungle's always trying to reclaim the right of way
   and the mangoes cacao turmeric goats soursop
   mushrooms cane plantains limes
   horses crayfish long-legged birds donkeys
   curved horns of cattle above dense grass
   ganja sensitive plant ackee
   and some thorn whose prick brings lockjaw
   and tires torn by sharp yellow rocks --
   young girl stares pensively from dark door in pale blue wall
   Big About and friends at their crossroads bar
   with its dirt corral for dancing
   drink soursop juice all day long
   in quest of the perpetual stiff bamboo
   and there's DANCING in PARADISE...
  
   Biggy Dread gunned down by police at Big Bridge March 16
   riding a mule cart to Sav-la-Mar pulled out a cutlass and they had to shoot
   that's what they say
   something tells me they like to shoot
   something in the eyes of the ones at the road block
   where they searched the car and tried to get us to confess to whatever...
   there's truncheons and gas down in Harbour St. --
   typical response where life isn't so sweet
   and somebody gets desperate enough to say so --
   price of fish price of flour
   going up up up almost by the hour
   and they throw away money on spectacular shows
   to show the world the right likes the right music
   and the Prime Minister sucks ice cream in the company of a happy band of children
   while a naked man, sores on his neck,
   lies for days in Washington Blvd. gnawing chicken bones
   and the Chamber of Commerce thinks there's too much crime
   and there's a kung fu movie in every town
   and there's DANCING in PARADISE...