III
PORTRAIT WITH LINES OF MONTALE
A patch of town-sick country
The old shop window shuttered and harmless
An odor of bruised melons oozes from the floor
Among wicker furniture and a mattress
Mildew like grass sprouts as well
The delicate capillaries of slime
Signs of quite another orbit
The ungraspable gorge
Sentiments and sediment
Where my carved name quivers
His laugh is jagged coughing
for my father
WE TALK DOGS
Or the one Maria found, trotting
along the banks of the Yuba—
the river his name, red
scarf around the snowy neck
that week of camping, coaxed
onto the backseat and taken home . . .
He mentions one—de raza alemana, he says
and I’m almost charmed by the voice:
telling how he’d tie his German
shepherd to a pole, escort her
to church: Plaza Santo
Domingo flanked by the park, kiosk
beside the roasting beef, pleasant
olor de carne asada wafting
to the bench after mass
where they talked—she mostly:
her sewing, her trip to Panama
in search of wholesale fabrics . . .
—I’m trying to picture it: Managua
in the fifties, my father’s
plane lifting off, touching
down, sending for her months later,
big with Maria, as I’m also
trying to picture him
on the other end of the line: in his
sixties, portly, sugar
in his blood, a whiff of something
on his breath as he speaks
of the Sacramento
River: pole and gear, sixpack,
Rocky and Comet slinking behind
—but the car’s busted now, he says
basting in gravel
near Chico. He gets to bed
past three, watching Cristina,
the Tuesday Night Fights, sunk
in a beat-up armchair:
replay of that memorable bout, Aaron
Pryor delivering a blur of shots
to the head, Alexis Arguello absorbing them . . .
During the phone call
we talk dogs. He had three,
we had two—something
I suppose, in common;
this talk of ours
a first.
VOICES
In bed, yes, during a state
between sleep and wakefulness:
she’d speak to me then, spirit
to spirit—not speech, exactly,
but a voice from her realm
to mine, though once she sang
“Caminito” by Carlos Gardel.
A large picture of me
in a white T-shirt taken
by a photographer friend.
She had it framed, placed
atop the dresser. “What became
of it?” I whispered to her . . .
I stuffed it in the drawer.
Didn’t feel like looking
at you anymore.
Once, she talked about my shirts,
the ones I did the plumbing in.
She’d put them on the pillow
to trick herself, closing her eyes:
I still slept, still snored beside her.
I cursed, swore, spit a palabrota
and off she bolted. Playa Pochomil.
Have you seen her, I said, and friends
pointed to the trucks, so I scoured
the beach, looking and looking
till finally I spotted her, crouched
up on a bluff overlooking
the surf. I saw you, she whispered,
calling my name.
I was testing you.
While in bed, yes, during a state
between sleep and wakefulness:
she’d speak to me then, spirit
to spirit—not speech, exactly,
but a voice from her realm
to mine, though once she sang
“Caminito” by Carlos Gardel.
NICARAGUA IN A VOICE
More than the poems
—the fruits that sang
their juices; dolls, feverish,
dreaming of nights,
city streets—for me it was
the idle chat between the poems:
cordial, intimate almost . . .
like a river’s murmur
as if a place—León,
Granada—could speak,
whistle, inhabit
a timbre . . . as if, closing
my eyes, I had it again,
once more within reach:
his voice—my father
unwell, won’t speak.
CANCIÓN
A dog I love growls
at the sight of me,
can no longer bear
his diablos, crazed
with the here, there,
how, all around him
the air howling. I sense
temptation to dive
into the void—glint
of his coat, hint
of a yelp a blade
to the throat.
Unclench, I say;
look: your ghost
father swims
in your ghost mother,
opens his snout
in your direction,
the sound reaching you,
soothes your sleep,
puts out the blaze
in your head,
is a quilt wrapped
around you, unfurls
down the path you tread,
or flaps in the wind
while you feed, keeps
you company, though
your spirit
is still a fuse—
SEASHELL
(Rubén Darío)
Half-hidden in the sand
is where I find it—embroidered
with golden pearls like the one
she held, riding over the water
on a bull. To my lips
I raise it, provoke echoes . . .
then press it to my ear
to hear the bluest fathoms
whisper of their riches.
This is how the salt
of a storm slowly fills me,
how those sails billowed
when stars fell for Jason.
And I listen to the voice
of a wave—deep
indecipherable wind . . . (the shell
is in the shape of a heart)
for Antonio Machado
AFTER FRAGMENTS OF JUAN FELIPE HERRERA
Hands:
Small, brown, like your father’s, cradle the timepiece he gave you, your eyes looking down at it, your feet half in, half out, the Pacific, your shorts cutoffs, frayed, your T-shirt white, like the one he wears in the photograph, Marlon Brando in A Streetcar Named Desire, you half laugh a little, lips slightly parted, if only you could talk into the wee hours, that time you visited twenty years ago, instead you mumble to yourself, your legs fatigued, blemished, you hadn’t noticed, phantom days, phantom nights, and now pretending to run along this shore, esta orilla, you have arrived by chance, re-creating him—in this poem
Eyes:
Here I am again, attempting to swim, my breast stroke reduced to rubble after decades of sifting, the years, I hadn’t noticed how flabby my arms had become, giggling in the moonlight a distant memory, summer nights we sneaked out, down to that corner of the river no one spoke of openly, side by side we would laugh and lick, laugh and lick, giving new meaning to a phrase, slip of the tongue, and no buttons to undo, no shirts to strain to see through, the rags of our clothes in a heap back at the cabin, instead the wet sand films our arms, our hands, our legs, as we cross, easily, the sea of our gaze
A WAVE
of the past as I walk
by a window boarded-up
breaks—cold
in winter and in
summer hot where
spiders lived and dust
filmed everything
in that storefront
that was his home. Or
a madcap air in May
or a combination
of words can bring
a voice to the surface
—it’s that I . . . at the
thought of him
which, more today
than yesterday,
is like approaching
a grave. His calls
before my first visit
flickered weekly,
are ash now. Cities
changed their names:
Madrid became
Corning became Davis,
South Bend,
D.C. I know
the beginnings
and the ends
of things. I
curb myself,
swallow what
cannot change.
But still, it is
there (he who
was torn
away no
longer
needs). But isn’t
it time this grew
fruitful, time
I loose myself
and, though unsteady,
move on—the way
the arrow, suddenly
all vector
survives the string?
with Akhmatova and Rilke
for my father
HOTEL MIRROR
Looking I thought: hair.
And a voice said
On your head? where?
Who is that staring back
with such a round face,
that paunch? Father
or son?