Christening

This river belongs to the man without a home.
Between classes I ventured through the brush,
and caught a glimpse of him skipping rocks in tattered clothes.
His torn black jacket had golden buttons that glimmered in the February sun.

I could see an equatorial line on his jeans, just above his knees.
Speculating on this line, I walked to Communications,
in awe of the man who owns the river.

Two weeks later I yearned for the moon, and the stars
and walked to the river side.
He stood submerged in it,
that line I had noticed earlier, marked his convergence with the Hudson.
His arms out spread, as if receiving the Holy Spirit of the crescent,
he basked in his midnight audience.

The water was jet black, and the tide calm as mahogany,
but I have a life to lead,
and blood to bleed,
before I bathe within sea.

Seven Year Old Musings

Little Sakura asked-"What happened to Christine, I miss her?"
"We aren't friends anymore"
With the crystal clear logic of a seven year old angel,
she quickly responded
"Why aren't you friends anymore? I liked her"

I felt my phone burning in my pocket,
the digits practically pressing themselves.
Her emery eyes blazing the brand left on my heart.

"Sakura, you're going to be a lawyer one day"

Pharisee

I read some Dickinson,
And promptly left English 109-Literature at work,
So I could rush to the nearest computer lab and write a poem.

“We grow accustomed to the Dark” had inspired a commentary
on the idiocy of American academia.
A few digressions later
I realized I no longer had the creative spark to write a poem.

I returned to class, defeated.

Promenade Wanderings

We walked the Brooklyn bridge, drowned in bitter cold
that whipped mist from the Atlantic onto our tender lips.
Her dirty blond hair teased my face with constant brushes
instigated by the oceanic winds.

I still remember walking the tightrope between
every man's worst nightmare, the "friend zone"
and the place where our eyes intertwined into the story
of our happily ever after.
The Brooklyn Bridge never seemed long enough.

One day she invited me up to her room,
mementos of herself tattooed her wall
every piece of art, and photography,
a hearkening to a past I didn't know,
with insight into the future I wanted to live.

He called,
and she asked me if she should answer.
I liked her too much to tell her no.
I left so she could talk privately,
and that was the last time I saw her in person.

The Brooklyn Bridge never seemed long enough.

Eight Thirty A.M. History Lecture

While I wrangled with the Sandman to keep my eyes open,
during a discussion of Christopher Columbus' treatment of the indigenous
I noticed a crucifix on the wall near the windows.
Our lord and savior was surrounded by water damaged walls with chipped paint,
and rusty lead pipes.

Amen

Phantom

Last night during the witching hour
I woke up in a cold sweat.
Perspiration forced from my body
I knew that you were the fire burning in my
sanguine vessel.

Time never reverses his firm grip
around the neck of mortality, however,
As the morning dew collects, and our rested faces
venture into new winds
your aspect grows more beautiful second by second.

Love is an apparition that mingles in the minds of men
turning rationality into feeling.
Before the windows of my soul, I gaze upon your demon
the phoenix of my lifelong passion for you reborn.

I lay me to sleep, and pray for your intervention.

"Robert Frost's discussion with a Rose Bud"

29 January 1963

It's been too long since you've blessed my nostrils,
your fragrance like melodies from the French quarter.
You will never understand the sway you hold over me,
but that shouldn't concern the mind of a child.

All of my writings,
considered legendary visions inspired by your predecessors,
could never invoke the emotion animated by your wonder of this magnificent world.
I know you'll struggle to find your place, among your August cousins,
who melt the sorrow off human hearts and remind us that Nature is eternal.
I want you to know that your energy and spirit in life,
resonate through the manuscripts of man's history.

Eva Braun

My canvass has never painted a more beautiful picture
of a more beautiful women,
like a rare jewel hidden in the depths of Poseidon's empire
your image shines through the dark abyss of this imperfect world.
I know.

Artists, they take liberties and over indulge the mind in
useless scenery that sceptics search within,
but you, Eva, perfect Eva, are the muse which moved the pen
to tell the story of the face that launched a thousand ships.

On this villa, over this mountainside
I see your face in the wind that brushes tree tops in the distance
to form a wave through nature,
like God's hand wiping impurities from his earth.

Soon we will have Paris like two
star crossed lovers lip locked in Venice,
and our french love will perpetuate through the world.
Our kisses a break from the bombs that burn in my mind.


Always Yours, In Death and Thereafter

-Adolf

Letter to Lela

If you could smell the food my lela used to cook....
that little swag as she danced around the kitchen,
those boriqua hands, aged in years,
were young as love,
in that project tenement kitchen.
she used to tell us how she left puerto rico,
i'd see it in her eyes...
puerto rico was her first love,
she left her for dreams, hopes for a family in the future,
that American dream, was always lying,
because my Lela stood young for puerto rico,
and people always said she looked 10 years younger
than her actual age,
Why?
She did it up for puerto rico,
and during those cold new york winter months,
when it snowed so much that her bus was delayed,
and when she got on her bus young men
sitting shivering and numb from the blizzard of the bronx,
wouldn't even stand to offer a seat,
but she never stood in vain,
her Rican legs stood proud,
they walked an entire family into existence,
salsa floors to hospital hallways,
those young legs marched for me,
and my father, and my brother....
those young puerto rican legs
said Fuck 60, im feeling 16
and I can't stand these trees in new york city,
Im thirsting for palm trees and coco rico,
and gossip with my girls,
underneath the wise old sun on beaches white as heaven,
speaking of heaven she never sinned,
and I know that's not true,
but if a sin is something wrong, lela only did right,
and when she went to church, the wisest,
most well versed pastors knew that her humility was unbecoming,
she was too kind, she was bright,
she probably read the bible one hundred and one times,
but when the pastor talked, she listened,
and sometimes I could see the exhaustion
pulling down on her gorgeous eyes,
and I know she wanted to dose off,
and I've seen her do it, at times,
but never in Church, it seems God and Puerto Rico
had too much respect from Lela.
I want her to know that they both respect her.
And if she prays, God listens.
And when she steps off that plane into her motherland,
it gives her a big old hug and asks where she's been.
She's not dead and this isn't an obituary,
this is respect from a grandson who forgot about peurto rico
and forgot about God, but would Never, in his long
tedious life, full of vanity and sins and darkness,
forget about Lela, the woman who taught him how to be a man.
And her little anecdotes about life,
and her stories about persistence,
and passion, and sufferance.
I don't know the definition of a profit,
and I never knew Dr. King, or Gandhi,
but Lela was my saint on earth.
And I know im far in spirit, and im far in presence,
but every time I cook,
I have that little hop in my step, that little bounce,
that little swag.
Lela lives in me and she won't die for shit.
When she comes to my wedding im gonna let my wife know,
I'm gonna point to Lela, and tell my wife on the alter,
this women is your role model of a wife and a mother,
and if your even one percent the woman, and wife, and mother that she was,
you would be the second greatest woman, and wife, and mother. In the world.
Gracias.

-Foofie

Ode to Oedipus

The sickle of time’s most invested agent
haunts the shadows, and never ceases.
As I look into my lover’s eyes,
I see the hands of time ticking up and around,
Like inverted sex, on an unholy matrimonious bed
The youth flood the streets with signs screaming in revolt,
Old men push buttons and young men die,
While the newborn’s eyes are pierced by the light of death
And every second is a token from the reaper,
His economy running on lost opportunity,
Has given us the most unsolvable of riddles.
The sphinx was never the problem,
It was the king.