Take What You Need
I remember Abuelo,
sitting on the porch,
his face held by the sun.
I hinted Hershey bar;
as usual, he said,
Coge lo que necesites.
The run up the stairs
never happened as I
looked over my nose
at the top of his dresser.
An old Café Bustelo can
overflowed with pennies,
nickels, dimes, and some
huge shiny quarters.
Beneath his oval mirror
lay an ancient
scorched black bible.
I watched Abuelo
slowly lift
its crumbling cover;
gently turn
one crinkly white membrane,
then another, slow,
like an old Taoist priest
sliding the Chi
down from his wrists,
into the cup of his hand.
* This poem first appeared in the now non-existent The U.S. Latino Review.
Speaking in Stones
I
The Stone
told The Sculptor
what it wanted
to be. The Sculptor
melted into tears.
II
The Stone
told The Sculptor
what it wanted
to be. The Sculptor
turned to stone.
III
The Stone
told The Sculptor
what it wanted
to be. The Sculptor
panicked and ran to
The Psychoanalyst.
IV
The Stone
told The Sculptor
what it wanted
to be. The Sculptor
secured a new stone—
a silent one.
V
The Stone
told The Sculptor
what it wanted
to be. The Sculptor
said, “Are you kidding?
I’m no Michelangelo!”
VI
The Stone
told The Sculptor
what it wanted
to be. The Sculptor
smashed The Stone
to bits.
VII
The Stone
told The Sculptor
what it wanted
to be. The Sculptor
was deaf. The Stone’s
screams did not help.
VIII
The Stone
told The Sculptor
what it wanted
to be. The Sculptor
confessed he was really
a painter. The Stone
said, “Paint me.”
IX
The Stone
told The Sculptor
what it wanted
to be. The Sculptor
questioned The Stone’s
imagination.
X
The Stone
told The Sculptor
what it wanted
to be. The Sculptor
died trying.
*Posted on the poet’s personal blog
Grains of Rice
A tiny bald monk
wrapped in orange robes
walks a slated path
to an old wooden shrine
in the silent green
countryside. Seeing it—
instead of walking
farther
to a sharp right turn,
he cuts across
the Temple’s
rock garden—
his dusty sandals
crunching gravel—
like rice being threshed & sifted.
(Kamakura, Japan, 1987)
*Posted on the poet’s personal blog
