Self Portrait of the Tower
When I close my eyes
I see sixteen.
Sixteen lanterns, etched with the woe of new time’s end, fall to the ground
And build the earth in ruined pyres,
piece by piece.
Sixteen figures shone like white light in the darkness,
The distress manifests as smudges on their clean skin.
They don’t belong here.
Sixteen darknesses blend like soft watercolors
And bleed into the fabric
That frays into the great patchwork.
Sixteen.
When I close my eyes,
I am sixteen feet above them.
Sixteen towers claw at me,
Cresting gloriously upward
Towards my eye.
Sixteen fires crash like gunpowder and bubble
Up the surface, searing my eyelids
Like the burning arms of a dead embrace.
Sixteen.
When I close my eyes,
The fibers of my being merge into the darkness
Sixteen times, I am stabbed and pierced and threaded
In the great needlework of Diablito and I know
We are the product of his life’s passion.
Sixteen times a string is stretched and cut
And another soul is shed
With the ease of biting off a nail.
Sixteen.
When I close my eyes,
The white marrow of my figure falls into the fire.
Sixteen times,
I am forced to open my eyes –watch–
As I feed the fire.
Sixteen times,
I am forced to scrape upwards –Starving–
I am the fire.
Sixteen times,
I am forced to needle my body to sixteen pyres –burning–
Until the darkness bleeds into the frayed edges of my great patchwork.
Sixteen.
When I close my eyes,
I see sixteen.
Easter Weekend
Beyond the garden wall,
The children foster a greenhouse to call their own.
This much is unavoidable.
Silly, how children grow as quickly as rabbits!
Whatever lays ahead of her waits now,
Sinking into his sternum,
The dusk slips on a star-striped nightgown and
Bunny slippers.
He, with his cabbage flower eyes,
His marshmallow embrace,
At every second glance, a secret exchange
Of pollen-
Oh! If only to live as a field mouse!
Living her days resting in a bed of his scent,
As his petals shade her from the outside world
Like a sweet treat in sugar glass casing.
When the morning bloom arrives,
She, too, will be snatched up by lively currents.
But for now,
The night is young.
Its tender feet stroll like darkness over them.
It plucks stars like children take dandelions,
releases them into the breeze.
Their worries lift.
