Poetry Thursday - Midsummer, Tobago by Derek Walcott

Midsummer, Tobago

Broad sun-stoned beaches.

White heat.
A green river.

A bridge,
scorched yellow palms

from the summer-sleeping house
drowsing through August.

Days I have held,
days I have lost,

days that outgrow, like daughters,
my harbouring arms.

                   Derek Walcott 

When I read this in World Poems on the Underground, the image that came to mind was a painting of a drifting canoe - by Chris Ofili, I thought, but no - Ofili has painted tropical scenes, but more of a deep blue heat than a white heat. No, it was Peter Doig who painted "my" canoe - he lives in Trinidad now (as anyone who has gone through Canadian winters might want to do) - before moving there he had been in Trinidad together with Ofili on a residency, and Ofili lives there now too. 

The canoe I remember, or seem to remember, disappearing along a river that winds through a tropical forest, is not to be found (it's not this one; or these...). Instead, as a sort of illustration to the poem, here's "magic-realism" image by Doig that has a feel of the tropics -

"The Music of the Future" by Peter Doig (from here)

Read an analysis of the poem here. Walcott won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1992.