The Leaning Palm

A palm tree leans across the white sands of a tropical beach. It once stood proudly vertical until a high tide undermined its roots and it almost fell. It recovered; and then slowly it turned its crown upwards again, seeking the sky.

Far out across the lagoon with its shifting shades of aquamarine and indigo lies the white line of the reef. There, pressed on by the constant trade winds, the relentless swell of an ocean breaks across a coral rampart. Day and night, the tree hears this destruction as a distant, never-ending boom.

It is late afternoon. The heat of the day has subsided. Shadows stretch across the sand. As the sun sinks behind Africa....

....the skies turn red with the sunset.

It's the end of another perfect day in a place that is as close to paradise as it is possible to reach.