justice and equality on these American
tongues? What future is prepared now
in the name of Anglo-Saxon superior
myths? what will become of our sons
and daughters when greedy old men
and women are done disemboweling
the people they call filthy illegals and
spics?
Blasphemy
I saw you last night in a
tear still talking of things
you love, no less certain
of the world turning ever
so slowly in the direction
of God, recollecting out
loud the humblest times
at a kitchen table sharing
hard bread and talking of old
women in the big church who
pray on its steps with disfigured
hands reaching out to heaven. I
saw you in the tiny drop of water
shared, in your whispered words
telling a truth from someplace
else you say can stop arguments
in the world and you the whole
time promised to take me to this
space even before I renounced
my blasphemy or bothered to
kneel in the dark.
Nieto
on nights like this I bet you
think it’s easy to lasso the
stars, drag them behind you
like a kite in the sky and in
deep hours laugh beneath
them until bells ring inside
our limbs. tonight, we will
drink the air with your first
year breath, smile beside you
with clear brows, confess a
world of milk and honey and
feel warm from this June day
for the rest of life. on nights
like this we will sit for hours
with wide-mouthed flowers
sharing perfumed smiles, with
dreams hanging from our eyes,
stories in two languages gushing
from our lips and you Oliver
will know the ancient songs
with certainty flowing in your
saintly blood!
Tompkins Square
when the moon rises
above the rooftops I
find time to play with
shadows that make me
think about meeting you
nearly every day on the
same bench in Tompkins
Square park. we talked
of abandoned tenements,
vagabond cats singing into
the early morning dark, new
immigrants squatting in the
empty buildings, the Ukrainians
at tables on first Avenue eating
beet borscht, the hundreds of
hustlers on New York’s streets
strumming guitars, entertaining
the public with jokes or begging
to make the next meal. you looked
innocent on the Lower East Side,
a foreigner still dreaming of the
warm sun that pranced the edges
of the rainforest, never troubled
about having no place in the new
world, your voice gently falling
into me and the stars declaring
you alive. I held your clay hand
in mine, loved you completely
and promised to tell the world to
see life in your undocumented
flesh.
Steal Away
I spent many hours walking
the streets, crossing bridges
into other boroughs at night
to get a good look at the city
in glimmering light, feeling
the cool breeze brushing the
dirt from the corduroy jacket
given to me by an elderly Puerto
Rican man who saw me sleeping
alone in the basement behind
Cookies apartment. Often, I
went to the rooftop thinking
about
