On the Arles train platform four nervous young men wear colours of sand, shades of burlap, mahogany, calfskin, as if the four rose from a desert draped in dun clothes, dun packs, and now in France wish to blend in.
I scan the track’s vanishing point, seeking a shimmer over distant rails that means our train to Marseille exists. We are leaving Arles after exploring the spooky Camargue region, a windy delta where the Rhone River seeks the sea …
Bio:
Mark Anthony Jarman is the author of 19 Knives, My White Planet, New Orleans Is Sinking, Dancing Nightly in the Tavern, Knife Party at the Hotel Europa, and the travel book Ireland’s Eye. His novel Salvage King, Ya! is on Amazon.ca’s list of 50 Essential Canadian Books and is the number one book on Amazon’s list of best hockey fiction. His latest book is Touch Anywhere to Begin (2022), and his next book, Burn Man: Selected Stories, will appear this fall.