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One
I went to sleep and pulled the dirt over my shoulders
the pebbles rolled down my cheeks and rested
on my still-inflated breasts.
Gone to sleep, undisturbed and forgotten under feet.
No more Maltas from the gas station, no more glances
at the misfortune of the living.
Shadows, silences, and brash light all without me.
I went to sleep and no one woke me.
Two
No one will fight like me, but not today.
My heart still thumps as my mind fills with doubt.
You are coy with your love, passion, trust, and I am the one
waiting.
You are the ocean, and I am the child at the shore,
Hoping your waters will splash on my feet.
Three
I will let my emotion flow like bits of concrete
sit perfectly still with your back to me, so I can hear your
breath to know
another exists.
My neighbor knows she exists
because of her heavy-footed stomp
up and down stairs,
her dog barks his greeting,
and the sounds from her apartment tell me she is inventing something
I get smaller, quiet as an ice cube in a warm sink,
melting toward the edge of its abyss.
El Ultimo
I pulled a thread, but Papi's life cannot be undone, and it
remains ugly.
People who could exchange stories with him, his witnesses, are
dead.
He is a guard dog: mangy, sitting on a porch, trying to make
himself useful.
He wanted to do something good, but did not know how.
I dream of him on an open road, looking tall and healthy like
an American.
His hands on his hips; he looks straight ahead and
does not waver in his decision.
He would say, "We're going down this road."
He looks back at his woman, and the bright afternoon sun makes
him squint.
She does not doubt him.
They smile at one another, and he holds out his hand.
They walk down the road - talking and laughing without an inkling
of me
- give up my birth for this dream,
Erasing myself as if I were an unnecessary extra. |
