I often

think of you.
Your wife two paces behind.
Sixty five years she faithfully followed.
Her crooked love hooked to your belt.
If only you had deciphered the lines
on her callused palms,
you would have known
her simple love.

In the immense moment
you were contrite.
Your foreskin cut,
your spirit circumcised.
(All those tiny deaths --
for what?)
You must have loved her.

Now
twenty years later,
my love sleeps
constricted by a woven blanket,
I teeter/totter
at the edge
of our bed
__ eyes mangled
__ tongue mutilated.
("Sixty five years,"
I lament.)

Winter nights,
when the Great, Gray Whale
floats above my house,
her siren suffocating,
there's a knock at my door.
My windows rattle.
“Don‘t be afraid,"
I say to self.
"Let him in.”

I don't --

"Come back tomorrow.
When the trees are full
and the grass is green."

This summer night

I am eye to eye
with our Lady
de La Luna.
The golden orb
hovers over the city
illuminating
neighborhood boys
that whisk around corners
on dirt bikes
whooping and hollering
as church bells toll.

Tonight
I enjoy
my hanging Petunias,
Brown-eyed Susans,
Belladonnas,
Lily of the Valleys,
a Cuban cigar,
a beer,
and the happy chatter
of my family
emanating from the kitchen
as light flows out the window.

A gentle breeze,
breath from mother earth,
plays a beautiful, strange melody
on wind chimes.
What mystery does she offer,
or is it simply a lullaby
to soothe troubled hearts.

From Roberto's house
a woman giggles
as he strums a guitar
and sings a love song.
Smoke from a fire pit wafts in the air
and shadows, as if spirits of an ancient race,
dance against Don Antonio's
200 year old oak tree.

Big Bear plays in the stars
and so does brother Wolf,
and Morning Star.
Will they visit Ghost River?
Who will they see?
"If you meet father or mother,
tell them I love them,
and all is well in my life."

A spider lands on my shoulder.
Its huge abdomen, spindly legs,
and fierce eyes of death
bring no fear.
Tonight we are brothers
and exist in the moment.

This summer night
I am at peace
and in love
with the world.

On Mother's Day

How lucky can a son be.  For sixty-nine years, mom was a blessing to all who knew her. I love you and miss you mom.  Happy Mother's Day.


Links to her poems:
http://pinchepoetpomes.blogspot.com/2007/01/himno-1.html

http://pinchepoetpomes.blogspot.com/2008/07/con-toda-palabra-by-lhasa-de-sela.html

No Arms, No Legs, No Worries

Sheryl Luna posted this video on her blog.  Inspiring ...

Introspection (pome #4)

 

At sunrise, I awaken

to a cavern in my chest.

To every question, an echo.

There is no answer.

In desperation, I search
the fields.

All day I wander aimlessly.

I come across a pool of light;

in it, a blue stone --

O God, 

what wonder!

Never forget this day,
this life:

a field, a pool of light,

and in it, a blue stone.

Sometimes (pome #7)

Laura rises
Christmas morning.
"Don't fuck with me," she snaps.
"I don't want to argue

-- you hear me!"

I drift towards the table,
bite into an elephant ear.
They're not as good as mom's buñuelos,
but Durango's are pretty good.

"Did you get me anything," she asks.
"Probably some cheap shit from Waldo's Dollar Mart?
You can take it back –

you're such an ass."

The tamale is hot --
nothing beats a pork tamale
with a cup of chocolate.
My great-grandmother use to say
in the old days
our people made tamales filled
with frog meat

-- I think I'll just have coffee.

"You didn't think of me --
did you?
Look!
We have a shit-pile of presents,
and not one is mine.
Not one!
I know we agreed,
but I bought you stocking stuffers."

The Christmas tree is gorgeous.
The tradition comes from her people,
but I've never seen Laura lift a finger
to decorate the freaking thing.
"You’re a jerk,” she cries.
“Last night you had your way with me
-- didn't you?"

"You’re such a bitch," I sigh.

She buries her face in her hands.
I want to hold her, but she'll push me away
then we'll really go at it.

I want to tell her
the kid shot dead last night
was Isaac.
I want to tell her
my nephew, Miguel,
is in Kendall
and could be going downstate
for thirty years,
said he was worried
about homosexual stuff,
and we both laughed;
but when I was in the parking lot,
I wept till I almost choked.
I want to tell her that Mundo
has AIDS and isn't doing well,
and they're all under twenty.
I want to tell her all this shit,
but I don't.

I want to tell her
I miss my old man and mom.
that I miss mom's
daily prayers for me,
that I miss my old man's voice
at church on Christmas Eve,
but instead, I mumble,
"You know,
the tree symbolizes the trinity.
You know, the shape of it --
the triangle.
The Father, The Son, and
The Holy Ghost."

I hear noise ouside the window.
It's Juan and Teresa.
They stumble across my yard.
Snow spirits swirl around them
and disappear in the wind.
They’re consumed by firewater.
Their laughter jars my bones.

"The other night," I begin,
"I caught Juan behind our garage
giving some old fart a blow job."
Laura doesn't even look at me.

"In the old days,
he was so beautiful,
gliding across the football field.
No one could touch him.
He led our offense,
and I anchored our defense.
We were Cisco and Pancho.

Sometimes,
you just need a break.
One fucking break."

Laura turns on Nat King Cole.
He was my old man's favorite.
Chestnuts roasting on an open fire
comes in soft waves.

"You know, ain't nobody better
than Nat king Cole."

“Yeah, I know,” she smiles.
“All we need is Nat King Cole
and a white Christmas.”
She walks over and hugs me.

Outside light snow falls.
A line of Mexican women
balance huge bags of dirty clothes
on their heads.
They disappear around the corner,
their strange tongues fluttering
in an alien world.

She Hears Him

    















She dreams
he scurries across the floor,
and through any nook and cranny,
disappears into the walls,
then she awakens to an empty crib --
the house settling,
windows rattling.

All night
she hears him crying
behind the woodwork. 

Happy Union: A Path To Enlightenment

Happy Union, Texas, August ‘88,
at the waterhole north end of grandfather’s farm
where Kirby keeps his cattle.
It’s evening and a hundred and ten degrees.
Barbas de Oro is whooshing in from south of El Rio Grande.
The chaparral throbs & the cornfields rattle like pissed-off snakes.
I float in a pond, listen to killdeer & scissor-tails.
Frogs plop in the water & ripple after ripple
pass through me --
I’m a buoy connected to Yahweh.
My penis bobs in the swish\swoosh
body of water & I muse –

if Jesus is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent;
if He is here at this moment,
has He counted every hair on my head;
if He knows me completely,
and I know Him,
having consumed the body
and tasted His blood,
if He is here, now, with me,
does He hover in the clouds,
arms raised, palms turned outward,
pale face, blue eyes,
a halo above His blond hair;
or, is He in the water
nude,
dark, shiny as a stone;
hair raven & in curls,
eyes black & catholic?

“Well Rabbi," I begin,
"It’s like this --”

I talk late in the evening.
And It’s just me & Jesus
-- neither here nor there --
in the heart of Texas,
in a slow spiral,
our heads bobbing
in the swish\swoosh
body of water.

Ruminations

Sunday,
11:00pm on a chilled, shallow fall –
hanging,
just hanging,
at the corner of Titsworth and Seminary.
My moon-corked mug
face to face with St. Augustine’s cross
burning in an ashen sky.
The hunter's moon
a colossal wafer
on my Lord's plate.

I open my mouth as if to accept
my Messiah's flesh
and take a shot of tequila
as if it were His blood.
I close my eyes and imagine
I’m in my Father’s house
and it's
the last supper.

My thoughts are housed
in the wayward wisp of the 7th hour.
I ruminate --
a sacred cow
regurgitating my fascicled life
and all the indisputable malarkey.
And its Sunday,
and all my frailties and sorrows
are cratered in my solar plexus

(Of all things,
in my solar plexus).

And

I reminisce

remember

ruminate --

I was twenty,
and it was long ago.
I rocked the pulpit,
lit the temple in flames.
Mother played,
"Come as you are,"
and father's tenor
melted
the hard-hearted.
I spread my arms as if on a cross
and something whooshed out,
and I was lost
in the ruckus
of
The Light.

O,

amazing grace

sang my soul.

Elia wept at my feet.
Her grandmother danced and whooped
as if she were eighteen.
Old man Javier
jumped up and ran down the isle
shouting hallelujah,
and Santiago, once filled with rage,
hugged and kissed everything in sight.
Brothers and sisters broke out in song,
and on their knees bathed in Living Water.
The Word lived,
and I preached with conviction,
my love without condition.
I moved mountains
and raised the dead.

O,

amazing grace

sang my soul.

But I was twenty,
and that was long ago.
Now
my thoughts are housed
in the wayward wisp of the 7th hour,
and I ruminate --
a sacred cow
regurgitating my fascicled life
and all the indisputable malarkey.
I try to purge,
wash it clean
with shots of tequila and whiskey.
Church bells start ringing,
and I am singing.
St. Augustine's cross is burning,
and I am singing.

It's Sunday,
and all my frailties and sorrows
are cratered in my solar plexus,
and it's 11:00pm and I'm hanging
just hanging
at the corner of Titsworth and Seminary
fuse-o-logged in the conundrum
of a homicidal night.

When Flowers Were In Bloom

When flowers were
in full bloom,
I saw you.
You were more beautiful
than any blossom
in any garden,
in any city,
in any state,
in any continent,
in any planet,

You were more beautiful --

When wildflowers sweetened
the bee laden days,
and sudden northern winds
blew those strange Saturdays
into so many lost Sundays,
I danced like a dervish
whirling, whirling
till flames burned
above my head --

And though you laid with me,
your heart walked
down a narrow road
to a temple in the east
never to return,
and I denied the ghost,
lost myself --

And in the evening light,
I sat in a pasture
with a thousand bluebells
and waited for the stars,
and in the night
the cosmos dark daggers
shredded my heart,
and I hung naked
on the North Star
and wept --

Still,
I thought,
You were more beautiful
than any blossom
in any garden,
in any city,
in any state,
in any continent,
in any planet,

You were more beautiful --

although

my daughter screams
all you do is get drunk and write poetry
it's not true
i've never been drunk a day in my life
although
i've written plenty of bad poetry   

Driftwood

An ocean of emotion. How cliché.
If that’s the case, then all I have is driftwood.
“I love your eyes, your smile, your lips.
The way you say my name.”

“Let me hold your hand.”
A kiss. A hug. I disrobe you.
Lick lines of dissent on your body.
“Let me love you?”

There is no shoreline.
Twenty-five years of flotsam
keep me from drowning.
I hang on in desperation.


“I love you,” she says.
I take a deep breath.
In this infinite sea, it exists for me.
It must suffice --

driftwood.

And It Was summer

One night,
as I smoked a cigar in my backyard,
the old Indian lady from across the street
walked over with her pit bull
and complained about the smell.
“You smoke mucho marijuana,”
she said pointing at my Backwoods.
“It’s a cigar,”  I explained.
“No,” she said, “You stop.”
“Listen, your dog barks all night long.
Do I complain?”
“You stop,” she demanded.
I said, “I stop when he stops.
Whatever his name is.”
She said, “Doe no.”
“You don’t know his name,”
I asked.
She said, “Doe no.”
“Don’t know,” I asked again.
“Doe no,” she replied.
“Wait a minute, his name is Dont Know?”
“Doe no,” she said as her freaking dog
took a crapzilla on my lawn.
She gave me the one finger salute,
and marched back to her fortress.
There after,
every morning
I’d find a steaming pile
of dog shit in my yard.

One day,
I planted jalapenos in the enriched soil;
and when the plant was full, I picked
and gave them to the old lady.
It was summer and the days were long:
bees buzzed the honeysuckles,
children played in the fields,
wives gathered in groups and giggled
like high school girls,
old men played cards
and young men serenaded their sweethearts.
The old lady walked across the street
with Dont Know and brought ice cold horchata.
We sat by my garden and talked  about the old country,
and the breeze made circlets of her hair,
and Dont Know barked at passersby,
and I smoked my Backwoods.
And it was summer and dreams were long,
and bees buzzed the honeysuckles,
and children played in the fields,
and we sat in my garden,
by the jalapeno plant,
and drank horchata
and let evening light
wash over us. 
 

And after so many years,

And after so many years,
the world slides off my shoulders.
Elephants collapse
turtles flee --
pink evenings,
valleys and mountains,
Wednesdays and Sundays;
all, all is lost.
Believe me --
earth is flat, and the ocean,
well,
spills over the edge.

And after so many years,
you say, "My love is yours."
What colossal weight --
please,
not another word.

The autumn roads we traveled
led us here
to a graveyard in my chest.
Buried there
my heart --

please,
not another word.