CARCACHA

Los minutos pasan
Como el tronar
De una suspensión adolorida

THE JOURNEY CONTINUES…


9

I waited in the car
Only to be blinded
By headlights of a truck
It parked about the 10 meters away
And a human being
Descended from inside the machine
The person walked
Towards the threshold of the mini market
And the florescent lights revealed
A prison guard’s uniform
Being worn by a woman
She was large an strong like a lioness in Africa
But that night belonged to the Arizona desert
And her hunting was done
Inside federal prisons
Entrenched in the isolation of the sands
And I tried real hard
Not the be a cynic
I fought the urge to mock with my thoughts
The apparition before me
And even though we were about equal in size
I knew she could take me out
In hand to hand combat
The way she walked told me that much
I remembered my neighbor
Fighting with his wife
And how he mellowed out as soon
As two policewomen arrived at his house
They were twice his size
And when he looked at them
He became very still and composed.

10

The future bearer of my offspring returned
When she opened the door
The desert air entered the car
I waited for her to say something
But she was silent and comfortable
In that peculiar style of hers
When I was about to ask
She said everything was funny
They way the clerk smiled
Showing his bleached teeth
As he gave directions
And it seemed as if he had been there
In that ascetical and legendary refuge
We followed the green arrows
And stopped at red lights
Even though the road seemed empty
We drove away from town
And its concentration camps
I followed the instructions
Given by the night clerk
Thinking to my self
If he sent us in the right path
The night was like snow
And we were an accelerating sled
I felt the strength of 8 cylinders
Running towards the darkness
To the back of us the electric glow
Got smaller with each mile traveled
Until we could only see the glow of the moon
Paisano is the name of the road
We were looking for
Paisano that Spanish word
That signifies fellow citizen
We were searching
For the paisanos of earth.

MY SISTERS MY BROTHERS AND THE FUTURE THAT NEVER WAS


In Iraq
The troops inside Humvees
Are big game
Texas soldiers
Know all about hunting
The AK bullet
Pierces a Hummer
As it does a watermelon
The 7.62X32
Will drop an elk
And the GI’s .223
Is used for coyote hunting
The difference is clear
Like the rich & the poor
Like & ivy college
And a community college
Like a CEO & a janitor
The future of America
Is splattered on the seats
The dashboards
Like modern art
The blood drips
On the desert’s sand
Becoming alchemy
For oil and profit

MORE POETRY COMING OUT OF THE SMOKE


7

Florence
42 miles

Was written on the road sign
And I said we’re almost there
And she did not reply
I lit another cigarette
Not before having to decide
If I wanted to inhale
The smokes I had bought south of the border
Or if I should use American made poison
I put the fire on the tip of camel
When I opened the ashtray
It resembled a mausoleum
As I drove I tried not the desecrate
With my carelessness
The ashes of the tobacco I was smoking
We’re in Florence said my wife
With her voice softened
By the desert's full moon
When I realized we were cruising
On the main street of a very small town
Petite like human tenderness
In a planet shaped like a basketball
And we found ourselves
At the end of town as soon as we entered it
I stopped the car and we just sat there
Thinking what we should do that night
In the rearview mirror
I could see glowing
Emanating from scattered street lights
On the windshield
Just the darkness of the road.

8

We made a U turn and head back into town
Looking for someone to ask directions
All of the sudden I tasted that feeling
Of not knowing were we’re going
And it doesn’t taste sweet
Like the ripe fruit of success
It has the bland flavor of frugality
The only place open was a gas station
One of those temples
That sell the elixir of progress
Today's Black Magic
Oil cooked into gasoline and plastic
We stopped just outside the entrance
And I could see their icons on the window
Visa & MasterCard
Together with the usual suspects
Inside there was the dim figure
Of the night attendant
A slim man who
Looked thankful to have a wage
He was watching television when we arrived
We decided my wife
Would ask for directions
Better a white female
Than a foreign male
In the middle of the night.

ON THE MARINA

I want to get
On one of those boats
And sail to you heart.

BY THE BAY

The morning is
In the mirror of water
Old white men
Ride bicycles.