© 2014 by David Tomas Martinez
FIRST EDITION
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced without written permission of the publisher. Please direct inquiries to:
Managing Editor
Sarabande Books, Inc.
2234 Dundee Road, Suite 200
Louisville, KY 40205
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Martinez, David Tomas, 1976–
[Poems. Selections]
HUSTLE : Poems / David Tomas Martinez.—First Edition.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-936747-86-3
I. Title.
PS3613.A786424H87 2014
811'.6—dc23
2013031026
Cover art: Tattoo design by Brian Romero.
Cover and interior layout by Kirkby Gann Tittle.
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Sarabande Books is a nonprofit literary organization.
| This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts. | |
| The Kentucky Arts Council, the state arts agency, supports Sarabande Books with state tax dollars and federal funding from the National Endowment for the Arts. |
For Glover, Sandra, and Tony
For Brittney
CONTENTS
II.
To The Young
Shed
Sabbath Fe Minus
California Penal Code 266
In Chicano Park
The Only Mexican
Innominatus
III.
Motion and Rest
Small Discoveries
The Sofa King
Apotropaic
The Cost of it All
Rebecca’s Use
Coveralls
IV.
Forgetting Willie James Jones
Of Mockingbirds
Scientifically Speaking
This Bird Chest Holds a Bird’s Heart
They Say I Teach English, I Say
A Sunday March
The Mechanics of Men
Notes
Acknowledgments
The Author
The dark peoples with things:
for keys, coins, pencils
and pens our pockets grieve.
No street lights or signs,
no liquor stores or bars,
only a lighter for a flashlight,
and the same-faced trees,
similar-armed stones
and crooked bushes
staring back at me.
There is no path in the woods for a boy from the city.
I would have set fire to get off this wilderness
but Palomar is no El Camino in an empty lot,
the plastic dripping from the dash
and the paint bubbling like a toad’s throat.
If mountains were old pieces of furniture,
I would have lit the fabric and danced.
If mountains were abandoned crack houses,
I would have opened their meanings with flame,
if that would have let the wind and trees lead my eyes
or shown me the moon’s tip-toe on the moss—
as you effect my hand,
as we walk into the side of a Sunday night.
1.
A car wants to be stolen,
