Rising out of lowland swamps
by the Mississippi River’s endless rush of water,
New Orleans reclines in an elemental embrace.
Her cityscape climbs skyward into air so burdened with humidity,
the river itself seems bound for heaven.
Synchronized with nature’s rhythms,
earth, water, wind and marsh
pulse their way into her music…
Professor Longhair, Dr. John, Neville Brothers, Tipitina’s;
her food… gumbo, crab cakes, catfish courtbouillion, red beans and rice;
her easy street slang… Hey Boo!  Ha ya do?
The city’s bond with nature kindles an affinity with prima materia,
with what’s desirable and undesirable, dark and even dangerous,
with wildness, not rebuffed, but welcomed.
She holds fast to knowledge acquired first-hand:
instinct as both unbounded destructiveness
and the “living fountain of the creative impulse;” *
instinct like Hermes’ entwined snakes,
wounder and healer perilously close to one another.

*Jung, C.G., CW VIII, par. 339