Brother, I want to hear your voice
and I don’t. I want to see what
we have in common, finally, after all
these years.
I want to meet the son that has
my name.
There is another version of my story
I’d like to hear out of your mouth,
and then maybe we can have some
family rest.
Mother, it happened only that
day, father’s death, and then you bit dust, confessed that you could not live
(without him)
I understand now that time
has passed in these eighteen years of weather-beaten sorrow, in poetry that hunts for remembrance
your face bespectacled
anointed with ashes of a frail body. You had a Masters in Mathematics, and knew so well calculations
of time breathing in soled feet
even as bodily pain did not blur the
angst of living.
My eyes vapid
are moist not with tears
but glisten with that photo
with you sitting beside father
demurring like a newlywed.
Disney characters embroidered on clothing
by Asian children tied to sewing machines
unsafe factories with designer labels
does Walt care about Haiti or Guatemala
of course not, then why on earth should you
Mickey Minnie Daffy Goofy Donald and Tweety-Bird
making adorable gifts out of nightmare childhoods
machine wash in cold water
do not add chlorine bleach.
Mellowing sun
winter’s husk
smell, and I love
the ever-belonging land
mingling with the chiaroscuro
of laden hues.
Now there is no use
telling those stories
dipped in black ink
water sprouts nowhere
as those stories are in
trance of no time.
Birds heave
clutter of time.
A pack of hungry hyenas
they would pry her open
to consume what is inside
they who have no interiors
who must feed off each other
yet remain ever unsatisfied.
What she possesses within
would not survive outside
in the open where they dwell
though what they need she has
to quell that inner emptiness
they cannot completely hide.
She perceives the void beneath
their noisy exteriors, smiling
inwardly while they orbit around
pulled but repulsed by her gravity
a closed book to these lost souls
forever circling never nearing.
Blue river of compassion
how those waves open
unfurl into righteous men
riding your waters
crescent moon and the hill
on other side mourns
lapping waves, cries of the seagull, lament of fishermen
in an island that is sinking.
There’s not going to be that moment, we’ve all had them,
When a doctor tells us that it’s all just a common cold or
Gas pains or merely an imbalance of the humors that will
Correct itself with time, or we can exercise and diet back
From what we thought was the brink. No, not this time,
This time, time becomes the bad guy, exercise and diet
Its close followers; now the aches and pains add up, stay
With us, our worlds become a bit smaller every day, we
Become one of those people we remember from our youth,
Those people who always mention their ailments as if they
Were essential to their identity, slower steps, smaller meals,
Elaborate plans for a calendar that has little more to do than
Mark more time spent. Getting older is built in, there’s no
Escape, no cure, no way to recuperate, no moment after, when
Things are back to normal, when we step out once more with
A new spring in our step and things are back as they were.
Leave me alone in this
seascape
of wilderness, crouching wind
blues, little ragamuffin of a boy, entering sleepless
in corridors of home, pine hills and summertime of
frisky birds.