Juan Felipe Herrerastill here i am still here at times still here in half-light at times with you peering at this odd-angled orb todavía estoy aquí for you yes para ti todavía still here i am for you todavía still here it is true para ti for you in half light it is this way still full face toward you still here for you at times i sleep at times all i can see barely at times the shadow that is me not me it is here still the door open at times burns w/o me even though i am still here todavía for you para ti on occasion you notice me look down i look down a smile yes a tiny smile comes to me for you para ti todavía aquí here for you here i am both of us in darker light filters than the last time we stood together todavía still here on this half orb both of us a father in a clean washed shirt after a scalding shower todavía still you me w/o the shadow at times the shadow i cannot tell i sleep the blankets folded and unfolded todavía still here para ti for you todavía todavía estoy aquí para ti still here i am still here here yes for you i am Arlene Bialaekphrastic poem based on Peter Foucault's "Embryo" here is the spark of an island among hundreds on a map. zoom in and admire the shape of things, the way her body sways and spatters whether or not you can see her doesn't matter. you will smell her sulfurous skin before anything. she's on the move. here is the contour of paradise you want to capture, but she is swift and leaves your graphite tips in the dust you may think she's a newcomer, but she has been here a long time. titanium, koa, abalone, salt water rising rinsing through her blood she runs the lava at midnight, her braided hair flowing for miles and unwinding only when she reaches the sea Yes, it has been years. and she wants to know why you never bother to say hello, or ask to come in, or take off your shoes before entering. why do you fix your gaze on her without offering her a song? or take selfies and then realize your boot souls are melting. she wants you to look beyond. will you? see the spattering on the golf courses, on the manmade beach. her veins are hard to see. do you know what "chicken skin" means? ask the locals. they will tell you. erase, erase the lines. embryo, she is. you have very little control. she will whisper in your ear that you both sadden and amuse her, and if you're lucky she will let you go. Originally published in More Good Talk: Poems from the Poets Laureate of Santa Clara County, July 2017. Oriana IvyTwenty years later I’m told I am foreign.
How naïve to have thought I’d grow out of it. As if I could erase that Columbus Day: in the morning I had a homeland; in the evening I had two suitcases. Twenty years later under desert sky, I remember the stencil of drizzle in Warsaw. On the sill of our old kitchen, pigeons ruffle like small gray clouds. My uncle and my father raise a toast with żubróvka, the buffalo vodka, the bottle lit with a blade of buffalo grass. I ought to remember in more vivid color, but I was carelessly young. I tried so hard: changed my name, ate only with my right hand -- eager to throw away extra vowels and hands. Twenty years later men still want me to touch them in French, slide toward them on slow Slavic looks: “You’re from the Old World -- You know how to treat a man.” I must be centuries old -- I am river and rain. And the half-remembered Warsaw parks, chapels of green dusk; through a fence of shadows I call after the long-lost child. Yet my true homeland is not lilac gardens, nor childhood’s palaces of clouds, but the undefeated republic of the mind. Among statues in a museum, no one says, as I used to, “Excuse me, I’m foreign.” No one is foreign. Aida SalazarMonday, September 4, 2017 We come from a long line of dreamers Bracero blood braced itself inside our veins generations of the ebb and go run and come back tumble of migrant imaginings for a better life an un-violated life a hunger-less life abundance measured by the cracks on our dishpan hands our book-filled hands our toiling hands our back broken hands bounty in belly hearts full despite Yankee spit on our faces or the swollen echos of “beaner” bleached into our skin grandfathers grandmothers mothers fathers children us lawful before laws abiding instead by the prophecy that we would wander back across lands our ancestors once abandoned survival etched into every impossible day inside this US where we’ve slept and awoken to loves long lost to customs to family to earth between barbed wire deserts and the greatness of a river now red with our blood Our futures fade into longing to stay, to ignore the mandate to return to the place where we are further unknown where not all is pristine like mountain like spring like memory. We remain, deemed dreamers denounced for dreaming inside the vacuum of history, erased where we must yet again fight for the light to be human to fulfill the furies of our expected failures the pains of the gutters of the margin to tear open the minds of those who wish to see us vanished to rise to be seen as citizen to be read as always having belonged. This was written on Labor Day 2017 as the government deliberated over the fate of DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals). If ended, 800,000 registered undocumented immigrants stand to be deported. Arlene Biala ekphrastic poem based on Guillermo Galindo's "Angel Exterminador" and Wim Wenders' film "Wings of Desire" she raced her little brothers to the top of the rainbow painted carnival slide the one she had been dreaming of all week feet clanking up the metal staircase rising in the middle of the desert town a mirage of fantastic colors, strange music and dust out of breath at the landing, she twirls in the four directions to the south: her abuelita's hands reaching out to her, cuidate mija watch your step, watch your step to the east, her mother's song: sing your way home, at the end of the day, sing your way home, cast your troubles away, smile every mile, it will lighten your load, it will shorten your road, if you sing your way home to the west, her oldest brother on a fishing boat, and to the north, the memory of her father's thirst in the melt zone never turn your back to the sea, he would say. the sea, the sandstorm, the blast of la migra, hail of bullets and the slide is lifted in a horrendous crash, twister of dreams, knocked the wind out of him, he is broken and bent without the name his ancestors gave him gutted like a fish, scales scraped off until the rust, the rust of his skin is gone and delicate flesh and the scorching sun have textured him a new name: angel. angel. noose of drag chain falls to the ground and the wind beats the corrugated lies out of the body, singing fly home my sweet angel, fly home through the sky . . . when the child was child she took a deep breath, grabbed the rough edges of burlap and let go. her body shooting like a bullet through border lies, blasting through impenetrable walls, her angels watching her fly. Originally published in More Good Talk: Poems from the Poets Laureate of Santa Clara County, July 2017.
John GuzlowskiWe came with heavy suitcases
made from wooden boards by brothers we left behind, came from Buchenwald and Katowice and before that Lwow, our mother’s true home, came with our tongues in tatters, our teeth in our pockets, hugging only ourselves, our bodies stiff like frightened ostriches. We were the children in ragged wool who shuffled in line to eat or pray or beg anyone for charity. Remembering the air and the trees, the sky above the Polish fields, we dreamt only of the lives waiting for us in Chicago and St. Louis and Superior, Wisconsin like pennies in our mouths. Persis KarimHere--the place where we speak their names in shadows and reflections, the trace of our belonging, in this refuge--still living in threads of memory--even when the infection of violence, chaos of new explosions force us to remember the dead, the scared, the hungry in Aleppo, Baghdad, Sana’a, San Francisco, Jerusalem we carry this prayer on our lips Hold your baby tight with the faith that someone will receive you, want you, want to know the story of your life, someone's hands will circle you, someone's heart will hold you, someone's nation will welcome you after someone else sought your erasure we carry this prayer on our lips In the requiem of light, you will be more than a displaced person, you will no longer be adrift in the open sea where your suitcase is the raft of your dreams, where your sacred prayer can float in the air of magnified hope and the cycles of the universe cannot stir a flower without troubling a star, Here, where we can be one-- whole-- moving in the canopy of the human. Karen CórdovaMy great-times-4 grandfather slipped on the trail of life,
crossing the Mexican border into California-- Jailed in San Diego. Branded like meat: illegal immigrant. Julián Popé thrown back into the oven of desert. He crossed the Mexican border, met California in rags, with guns and a few amigos. Imagine: illegal immigrant Julián Popé walking through desert, remembering sight of ocean—he hadn’t bathed in months, I imagine. Julián in rags, with guns and a few amigos, desired nothing more than land for his someday family, months before he saw the ocean. He bathed in hope, blind to the future: axe and drowning—the ocean his own blood. Desiring nothing more than land for his someday—family and freedom--Julián Popé returned to California, his blood-ocean future. Before the axe and drowning, he toiled as a miller east of the city of angels. For freedom, Julián Popé returned to California-- not his birthplace, Kentucky, or Taos, where he was baptized at 26. Julián toiled as a miller in East L.A. before seeing angelitos, twice leaving New Mexican hills and placitas. Why a tardy Taoseño baptism with birthplace re-christened Quinteque? He changed his faith to marry Maria Salazar, his primary vigil, and locked love’s door. You see, Julián Popé had lived in New Mexican towns and hills for 12 years without a legal wife—despite embarrassed records of a daughter or two. He changed faith to marry Maria Salazar after loving her prima, Ysidora Vigil. His son-in-law said Abuelo Julián Popé was mountain man William Pope,* years without a legal wife. Despite two daughters, records said natural instead of his name. My great-times-3 Abuela Juliána was named for Julián. We know our abuelo, Julián Popé, was mountain man William Pope-- Distant cousins call Juliána, Popé, to this day. He abandoned his natural children, including my great-times-3 Abuelita Julianita and her older sister. They never knew about the valley, or winery not far from Napa, named for their father. Distant cousins call Juliána, Popé, to this day. Cabrón abandoned his children, but ¡Aye chingao! he gave me life. What am I to think? Should I forgive him? Juliána never knew about Pope Valley, land grant of his death. I visited its winery, sipped merlot beneath two hundred oak trees he may have planted—it was easy to imagine. Julián’s transgression gave me life. I think I should I forgive him-- especially when I like being nieta of one who has a valley for namesake. It was easy to imagine. Same two-hundred-year-old tree roots drinking blood as merlot, absorbing screams. Julián’s axe. Accidental slice. Leg releasing sea into drunken earth. Francisco "Pancho" BustosThey took my cousin
and they took his wife too but they kept the babies here, al otro lado for being U.S. citizens. They searched and they searched so that an uncle or aunt could sign papers and they can let the babies go and that way, let them get back everybody back together in the land of their parents, “But they need un “es-sponsor”” the government lady kept saying. And my cousins-- without the car, without their things, without their closets of clothes, without their t.v. nor their papers from work but none of that mattered as much as the babies nothing was as important like the babies stuck al otro lado for being “yu-ez citizens” without “es-sponsors” stuck al otro lado, stuck, stuck. How can one sleep, eat, and calm down the nerves? The babies the babies the babies that was first, that was the only thing, it was what was missing. “Where might they be? What might they be eating? Who might be taking care of them? La inmigración, do they know how to take care of babies? El Gobierno, does it know how to take care of babies?” The government lady, she needed proofs, evidence “¿Pruebas de que?” my cousins asked, “what are you talking about señora?” “Proof that they’ll be in good hands” said the government lady “Someone with a house, someone with a car, someone with papers, someone with payroll.” And so the great American dream began to wear down and it felt like a strange dream, something filled with fear something that squashed the voices of the people without papers and that was how it was during the longest month of my cousins’ lives. Until at last, an aunt was able to sign, at last an aunt was able to be a “sponsor” and they finally returned to Morelia, Michoacán the land of their fathers and grandfathers too. We don’t know if the babies will ever learn Inglés or if they’ll ever seek the great American dream they deserve but my cousin and his wife are together again with their babies together again en Michoacán the place where their parents’ journey began and that of the parents of their parents before embarking on the great American dream the one they dreamed for their children and for the children of their children. Se llevaron a mi primo Por Francisco J. Bustos Se llevaron a mi primo y también a su esposa pero a los dos babies los detuvieron aquí en el otro lado por ser U.S. citizens. Buscaban y buscaban de que algún tío o tía pudiera firmar papeles para que soltaran a los babies para que dejaran regresar a los babies y así regresar todos juntos a la tierra de sus padres, algun “es-sponsor” decía la señora del gobierno, “alguien que patrocine a los babies”. Y mis primos-- sin el carro, sin las cosas sin la ropa, sin la tele ni los papeles de los trabajos, pero eso ya no importaba tanto como los babies nada importaba tanto como los babies atorados en el otro lado por ser “yu-ez citisens” sin “es-sponsors” atorados en el otro lado, atorados, atorados. ¿Como poder dormir, comer, y calmar los nervios? Los babies los babies los babies Era lo primero, era lo único, era lo que faltaba “Donde estarán? Que estarán comiendo? Quien los estará cuidando? Sabra cuidar babies la inmigración? Sabra cuidar babies el gobierno?” La señora del gobierno ocupaba pruebas “¿Pruebas de que?” preguntaban mis primos, “de que ‘sta hablando usted señora?” “De que estarán en buenas manos con el ‘es-sponsor’” contestaba la señora del gobierno “Alguien con casa, alguien con carro, alguien con papeles, alguien con ingresos.” Y entonces el gran sueño Americano se desgastaba y parecía algo extraño, algo que daba miedo y que aplastaba la voz de la gente sin papeles y así fué como fué el mes más largo de las vidas de mis primos Hasta que por fin una tía pudo firmar, por fin una tía pudo ser “es-sponsor” y por fin regresaron a Morelia, Michoacán la tierra de sus padres y también de sus abuelos. No sabemos si los babies llegarán a aprender el Inglés o buscar de nuevo el gran sueño Americano que les corresponde pero están juntos, mi primo y mi prima con sus babies, juntos otra vez en Michoacán donde empezó el camino de sus padres y los padres de sus padres antes de salir a buscar el gran sueño Americano que soñaban para sus hijos y también para los hijos de sus hijos. Karen S Córdova You must befriend the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. —Deut. 10:19 Follow Salt River through funnel of time, though she stings as she snakes through native sand, as she did when she flowed from Edith’s eye through her lot in another oasis, southwest of dead sea. Feel riverskin shed. Undulate, merge into border- flow, a kind of synovial joint between nations.* In 1827, mi antepasado, Julian Pope, shadowed serpent Gila, sliding from Taos to San Diego to escape La Migra. How dare this gringo from Quinteque flaunt Spanish law! Swim in the House of Mercy, Beth Seda, the rabbi said. Stand. Even on Shabbat. Watch angels trouble the waters of conscience. Don’t look back; step into this mikveh of names of daughters and sons of your great-great grandparents, as if listening to moan of mesquite under weight of axe, their exodus from somewhere other to the open tent of desert sun. Los Nuevo mexicanos y extranjeros were fertile and prolific. They multiplied and increased very greatly; the land was so filled, most of their descendants forgot the poor cousins, working on cotton farms in Appalachia or Sonoran fields of wheat. To cure illness in a family, wash each other’s hands or feet. Sprinkle the water over your garden. * From 1848 to 1853, the Gila River was part of the border between the United States and Mexico.
Marian HaddadYo he visto al águila herida Volar al azul sereno, Y morir en su guarida La vibora del veneno. Jose Marti, "Guantanmera" And for the cruel one who would tear out This heart with which I live. I cultivate neither thistles nor nettles I cultivate a white rose. Jose Marti, translation, "Guantanmera" translation, Pete Seeger I'll never forget the first FIESTA SAN ANTONIO events I attended, having visited from San Diego, a relative kindly took me, per my pressuring request, to what I heard was going to be an entire city metaphorically singing. Festival of foods and bright garb, dancing to live Mexican music, walking cobble-stoned streets or cement sidewalks, city coming out, at once And on the Friday before the final Sunday, morning after the night parade, where floats are lit and magic neon lines the streets, eleven days spanning, much of the city shuts down late morning or at noon the second Friday, in order to honor a traditional parade, Batalla de Flores, Battle of Flowers parade, a tradition borrowed from Spain, Catalonia, and Colombia. The first night I was exposed to the explosion of color, sound, and joy, was at what the city knows as NIOSA, Night out in Old San Antonio, the most charming city, becoming more charming? Colorful garb on all the women, casual or crisp, creased and cuffed shorts on men, their billowy Hawaiian shirts or fine-stitched guayaberas, cool linens in a warm night, lucky if breezes blow, blessed when they do, in a dank city that embraces heat and humid air, creating beads on beautiful skin, then the bright and popping colors of Fiesta wreaths around heads, the flowing varied ribbons, interweaving with womens' and girls' hair, the collected medals people make a love out of, yearly collecting, more and more and more, pinning them on lapels and sashes and belts and purses, donning them like a history they make; this year, a beautiful medal from the San Fernando Cathedral, the Holy Mother's graceful visage, as San Antonio celebrates its 300th year, newscasters remind, San Fernando Cathedral, is heart and central to the birth of the city, "In this City of Saints" ..."In this City of Saints" beloveds. Music and festivity, this city, always in throes of rhythm and energy and celebration, mariachis sing, tableside, at Mi Tierra, Guantanamera, guajira, Guantanamera. Yo soy un hombre sincero, "I am a truthful man," Seeger reminded in our language. A favorite event, yearly, Fiesta de los Reyes, adjacent to Fiesta Carnival, "val" carrying, or should, a Spanish-language inflection, a Mexican sound and flavor inside our mouths, this Celebration of Kings, transliterated; this Carnival, as well, adjacent, at and around The Mercado, The Mexican Market, Market Square, where we imbibe Nortena music, Tejano, a bajo sexto familiar in our air, makes us want to dance. And we danced, under the freeway, wearing our chokers, handmade by native artisans, turquoise and silver and wood, there we were, and many, dancing cumbia or corridos in our cowboy boots and straw cowboy or gaucho hats I somehow opted for ...San Antonians and tourists, alike, coloring the streets in their lime green and bright orange garb, splashes of color, energetic and wildly rich in their hues, rosa Mexicana, bursting with vibrancy, colorful as Carolina Flores's scarves, all these colors singing; if colors could sing, this is the season they would, these women in their Mexican traditional dresses, stitched embroidery making flowers on white crisp or bright-colored linen, airy and comfortable as smocks, stand and sway while working with their hands and history and hearts---there, beautiful, wise----native women, their salt and pepper braids catching the fragrant smoke rising from their grills or a makeshift comal, fire-hot surface on which they flip their native bread, brown bubbles pocking the tortillas where heat kissed the dough, hottest, slightly darker than golden, beautiful and bronze...  Oriana IvyI am standing still forever
in the amber of late August, in a rusty seaside landscape a rooster crowing and crowing -- and a drunken Russian sailor, weeping: See, you too don’t know anyone in this town. I am always leaving, leafing in unending autumn -- poplars toss as to a beggar coins of wind for luck -- parents, grandparents walking through bombed cities -- on missing graves they lay a wreath of smoke. I’m arriving: Go ahead, squeeze the lemon, this is America. A stranger greeted by strangers, I am always waving, smiling. I’m preparing for the future: I dissect rats and brains. Stiff with formaldehyde, a rat’s tail like an antenna sticks out of my purse. I receive invitations: Please come in your national costume -- But I’m standing still forever, a young girl about to step across the world -- my name trembles on the nervous loudspeaker. My name crackles, and I don’t crackle back. John GuzlowskiMy father dreams of pigeons,
their souls, their thin cradles of bone, but it is their luck he admires most. A boy in Poland in a dawn all orange and pinks, his hands opened like a saint’s and taught those birds to fly, to rise on the air, their wings beating the rooftops into flesh, into dreams of angels above the crystal trees. And later in the gray dawn clouds blowing about him in the camps, where not even pigeons were safe, where his body, thin then, like a shoelace, sought other dreams other bodies, and found only the comfort of worms—even then he could still remember the birds without chains, breathing quickly and cooing “We are going, we are going.” Fatma AssefI am the water lily of the world
I float and let my roots dance I wink at tiny fish because they know my story has been told by many who weren't-- aware -- I was the homeless citizen of the earth and I have tried to stay where I was born but stronger currents have pushed me out and water creatures stopped at my colors and beauty I like to float and swim at my ease I miss my home, but what can I do? The world has beckoned and the world is new! Now that I have tasted fresh water, my petals are glistening It pays to belong to the world, especially if it's listening. C. R. Tsiailistranslated to Portuguese by Joao DinizThere's a beautiful town, majestic
a town that splits the earth in two with tail in Europe legs in Africa and always the head looking at Americas you are always there your soul is surfing on the huge waves your soul inside the huge mouth of Montego. On the roofs of the town you have loved forever the flowers of time and the lost moment are sleeping the cats of pain, relief and silence are sleeping the flowers open -- the cats jump and you are standing on the lowest house always thinking about the Atlantic why are you sorry, why in pain, what are you waiting for? why don't you jump? Start doing the parkour jump like a leopard from roof to roof, again, jump from fence to fence sweetly kiss the girls, take the boys with you higher, one with the Figueira sky a company again on the shores to play football with the guys the buildings as you move in time will be higher as long as you cut the flowers and you make a bouquet it will be higher, it will be even closer on the sand, in the castles of your dreams when you were young, fearless bulls when you touched with your tiptoes the salty water for the first time and from the fingers you licked the flavours that the Amazon sent so that you want to go … to go… Why don't you jump, I shall give you wings I shall turn you into The Figueira Angel the old ladies are looking for you as they lay their clothes on the balconies the grandpas in the colourful coffee shops are looking high they are looking for you they want to know you are flying they are singing with you in the rhythm of joy the knights are saluting from the stone castles it is time you did it, close your ears to the sirens of melancholia the girls of Portugal are looking for you they want to see your reflection on the waves the perfect human god at Figueira Da Foz with the flowers, with the cats with the roofs unified from now on a grand stadium, a neighbourhood as we all play together the game of sorrow and joy the game of water and soil the game of loss and victory the game of life. Come, it is only a jump. Figueira da Foz - Jogos Da Água E Do Solo É uma cidade linda, encantadora uma cidade que divide a terra em dois com a cauda na Europa, pés em áfrica e sempre olhando para a cabeça para a América Tu estás sempre lá, tua alma a surfar ondas enormes, Nos telhados da cidade que sempre amaste tua alma na boca do enorme Mondego. Nos telhados da cidade que sempre amaste as flores do tempo e os momentos perdidos estão a dormir os gatos da dôr, alivio e silêncio estão a dormir, as flores abrem—os gatos saltam e tu estás de pé na casa mais baixa sempre a pensar no atlântico. Porquê te lamentas, porquê na dôr, o quê que estás a espera? porquê que não saltas? Começa a fazer parkour salta como um gato selvagem de telhado em telhado, novamente, salta de cerca em cerca beija as raparigas docemente, leva os rapazes contigo mais alto, um com o céu da Figueira nas margens serão um bando outra vez para jogar futebol com os rapazes com o passar do tempo os prédios ficam mais altos enquanto cortas as flores e fazes um bouquet, será mais alto será ainda mais perto na areia,no castelo dos teus sonhos quando eras jovem, touros destemidos quando tocaste com a ponta dos pés água salgada pela primeira vez. e dos dedos lambeste os sabores enviados pelo amazonas. fazendo-te querer ir…ir… Porquê que não saltas, eu dou-te asas transformo-te no anjo da Figueira as velhas olham para ti enquanto os avós sentados nos cafés coloridos, estendem a roupa na varanda olham para cima procurando por ti eles querem saber que estás a voar eles cantam contigo em ritmo de alegria os cavaleiros acenam dos castelos de pedra será hora de fazê-lo fecha os ouvidos das sirenes da melancolia. as raparigas da figueira procuram por ti, elas querem ver o teu reflexo nas ondas. o perfeito deus humano com telhados mais unidos, com flores,com gatos, na Figueira da Foz o jogo de perder e ganhar, a jogar juntos o jogo de tristeza e alegria o jogo da água e do solo um estádio enorme, um bairro, o jogo da vida. Anda, é apenas um salto. Φιγκέρα Ντα Φοζ – Παιχνίδια Του Νερού Και Του Χώματος Είναι μια πόλη ωραία, μαγευτική μια πόλη που μοιράζει στα δύο τη γη, με την ουρά στην Ευρώπη, τα πόδια Αφρική και πάντα το κεφάλι να κοιτάει Αμερική είσαι πάντα εκεί, η ψυχή σου σερφάρει στα τεράστια κύματα, η ψυχή σου στο τεράστιο στόμα του Μοντέγκο Στις στέγες της πόλης που αγάπησες για πάντα κοιμούνται τα λουλούδια του χρόνου και της χαμένης στιγμής κοιμούνται οι γάτες του πόνου, της ανακούφισης και της σιωπής, τα λουλούδια ανοίγουν – οι γάτες πηδάνε κι εσύ στέκεσαι στο σπίτι το πιο χαμηλό σκέφτεσαι πάντα τον Ατλαντικό γιατί λυπάσαι, γιατί πονάς, τι περιμένεις, γιατί δεν πηδάς; Άρχισε να κάνεις το παρκούρ πήδα σαν αίλουρος από στέγη σε στέγη ξανά, πήδα από κάγκελο σε κάγκελο, φίλα τα κορίτσια γλυκά, πάρε μαζί σου τα αγόρια ακόμη πιο ψηλά, ένα με τον ουρανό του Φιγκέρα θα γίνετε στις ακτές παρέα ξανά να παίζετε ποδόσφαιρο με τα παιδιά, τα κτίρια όσο προχωράς στον χρόνο θα είναι πιο ψηλά, όσο κόβεις τα λουλούδια και φτιάχνεις μπουκέτο, θα είναι ψηλότερα, θα είναι ακόμη πιο κοντά, στην αμμουδιά, στα κάστρα των ονείρων σου σαν ήσασταν νεαροί ατρόμητοι ταύροι, όταν αγγίζατε με τις μύτες των δακτύλων το αλμυρό νερό πρώτη φορά, και απ’ τα δάκτυλα γλύφατε τις γεύσεις που έστελνε ο Αμαζόνιος για να θέλεις πάντα να πας, να πας, να πας ... Γιατί δεν πηδάς, θα σου δώσω φτερά, θα σε κάνω του Φιγκέρα τον άγγελο, σε ψάχνουν οι μεγάλες κυρίες σαν απλώνουν στα μπαλκόνια τα ρούχα, ψηλά κοιτάνε οι παππούδες από τα έγχρωμα καφενεία, ψάχνουν εσένα, θέλουν να ξέρουν ότι πετάς, τραγουδάνε μαζί σου στο ρυθμό της χαράς, σε χαιρετάνε οι ιππότες από τα λίθινα κάστρα, είναι καιρός να το κάνεις, κλείσε τ’ αυτιά σου στις σειρήνες της μελαγχολίας, σε ψάχνουν τα κορίτσια της Πορτογαλίας θέλουν να δούνε στα κύματα την αντανάκλασή σου τον τέλειο άνθρωπο θεό, στο Φιγκέρα Ντα Φοζ, με τα λουλούδια, με τις γάτες με τις στέγες πια ενωμένες, ένα τεράστιο γήπεδο, μια γειτονιά, να παίζουμε όλοι μαζί το παιχνίδι της θλίψης και της χαράς το παιχνίδι του νερού και του χώματος το παιχνίδι του χαμού και της νίκης, το παιχνίδι της ζωής. Έλα, είναι μόνο ένα άλμα. Kristen D. Scottunder a lone surviving Elm and newly sown sweet
corn, Pancho rests, speaking broken Española the southern Colorado field, his barrio. Pancho calls my father Ye’s instead of Les. like tortilla or llama. My dad doesn’t seem to mind, even though he complains. Pancho tosses a stray mutt spicy chicharrón thrown from a brown paper bag, his belly shakes when the dog howls for more. “Ye’s la mirada” my dad nods his head pulls his Allis-Chalmers cap over his big blues, wanting to nap, but grins. Pancho’s cousin says he is illegal, he sends money to his wife, Theresa in Old Mexico, and has one son who farms in Fresno. Later, dad, says, “Pancho’s gone back to Chihuahua,” “lazy bastard.” A bit of worry deepens his eyes. My brother’s say, “Pancho’s been deported,” “deportado.” Since Pancho’s capture, we play outside in the evenings My mother throws a potato at my dad, grazing his bald head. “You’re smoking too much; the kids cannot breathe.” My father tells her, “Pancho’s son Pedro left Mexico because the water and air are dirty.” My mom does not hear him; he plants a big one on her and calls her, “hot-lips,” labios calientes. My mom comes up for air says, he will die of cancer if he doesn’t stop smoking. 15 years later he does. My father again, takes his siesta, tosses hot Vienna sausages to the stray he now calls, “Cisco.” There are no homemade chicharron. Cisco, whines. Together they stretch under the Elm with Pancho lost – my father and the stray, both American mutts, close their eyes under the resting afternoon las sombra. June 29, 2018 Wendy BarkerHouse after house. Every year, closets emptied. Clothes cleaned out, my dolls. Where did Mom take them? Salvation Army? A neighbor's garage sale?
Sandhill cranes, warblers, flycatchers, swallows—all fatten up before the long flight, need to keep those chest muscles strong, keep air moving through the lungs as they leave their summer home for their winter home, following the supply of grasses, seeds, insects. Then back again in spring. All the places Mom left. As a child, sailing from London to Hong Kong and back. At twenty, from Hong Kong across the Pacific to Seattle, the train to New York, and a year later, back to England on the Queen Mary. And then across the Atlantic to New York again. Alone. Songbirds return to the same spot year after year. Travel in flocks, rely on their neighbors. Safety in numbers. Those journeys can last twelve thousand miles. Less than half survive the trip. No aunts or uncles, no grandparents, no cousins around. Town after town, neighborhood after neighborhood, school after school, I was always the new kid, talking funny. And with asthma, as if a hole had been pierced in each lung. Flattened. Easier to pack. (First published in The Paterson Review, 2018) D. Ellis Phelpsalong the rio grande among carnelian melons & orange groves you can hear the coyotes crooning to a moon wide and bright as the river she loves naomi crossed this borderland for freedom cradling her infant son in her arms smothering his cries to quiet him: she cupped his mouth with her warm brown hand ~ she comes each week to clean solo hablo un poquito español i speak only a little spanish i say she speaks no english and so we agree to teach each other laughing a lot at the language barrier ~ we are standing in the kitchen with her naked toddler son the one she cradled and silenced in the box car where the coyotaje had hidden them the one she rode from her beloved guatemala to tejas so many hours con muchas otras desplazadas so many displaced ~ & when the rocking of the hot hot box did not stop her son’s crying i had to cover his mouth with my hands she says and just at this her son has to go & does not know he does not know how his mother’s hands have just cleaned this tile how she has scrubbed & cupped to save him and so he lets his urine: an easy yellow flow on the floor but quick his mother cups her hands to catch it… Ricki MandevilleMy roommate, having grown up in Alabama, has a charming southern accent. She says I remind her of Kristin, her best friend in high school at Decatur. Perhaps that’s why she confides in me, though I never ask her to. Tonight, home from her evening job, she confesses she ran a red light on her way to anatomy class this morning. Wheels too near the intersection to stop, she watched the light turn yellow, saw it flash red just as she passed below it, wondered if the intersection had a camera, doubled back, saw that it did.
Now she looks over her shoulder, waits for something bad to happen. People she knows have been pulled from their lives for just this small an infraction. People like her, with two jobs, two diplomas. People you’d never know came here from the hell of a harsh country, traveled in their mama’s exhausted arms, arrived as to a sort of Eden, knew carnivals and summer fairs, marched in Fourth of July parades, went caroling in Decembers, always meant to study Spanish, but were too busy keeping up grades for med school, people who knew the sacredness of a life. Through the day she looks over her shoulder for the man who looks official, the jacket with three letters. Someone who could steal her from her home. Even as she drifts to sleep, she is afraid. In dreams she sees herself sent back to a place she can’t remember, a place that was never home. In dreams she walks beside the ocean and wonders if the waves that break next to her wash back to touch the edges of the country in which she was born, the place that isn’t home. She sees her feet against the sand. In her dream, they grow pale roots, anchor her deep, immovable. Safe. Fatma AssefI lulled a child
once to sleep found faith on its quiet face sleep tight tomorrow brings the same sketches dog-eared on sidewalks words finished --green Ivy crawling up the space between my frozen front door here and my distant Alexandria faint beam the waves of wanting more-- waiting splits your skin weight stretches you thin pulls the will away watch my watchtower --collapse this ocean of yearning I will not wait anymore |