Eyes down sitting alone he is
below the salt outside the pale beyond the tracks
he is a twelfth grade Indian boy eating his lunch
unseen on the steps outside the school.
His parents are proud his cousins envious
of the accomplishments of this invisible boy
this solitary warrior who is a silent apparition
not seen not heard not known
by other students flirting and horsing around
on the steps after lunch unaware of the warrior,
those laughing girls in important peasant chic
and teasing boys in jeans and chambray shirts,
the proletarian kitsch of 1973.
Eyes down he eats two vapor sandwiches
and folds the brown paper bag into his pocket
then walks into school unnoticed,
a ghost floating past the guidance counselor’s office.
This morning the ghost took human form
for the counselor, who with shortsighted eyes saw
an Indian boy head down too shy unappealing
frayed shirt bad teeth a C student.
I was wondering about college, said the warrior.
It isn’t for everyone, said the counselor.
Below the salt outside the pale beyond the tracks
unseen in silence the invisible warrior walks point.
He is a woodland warrior in a foreign jungle,
camouflaged in wash pants and frayed shirt,
a C student with bad teeth and downcast eyes
the pride of his parents the envy of his cousins
the hope of his brothers and sisters, walking point
leaving tracks the impossible shimmer of our dreams,
tracks that trade the shade of the sky the hue of tomorrow
through the foreign jungle across cracked concrete
up the stairs through the Age of Aquarius crowd
to college.
Asin, you walked before us.
Asin, in your memory and honor
we now rise to our feet and walk
step after step in your tracks
that we broaden to a path
the shade of the sky
the hue of tomorrow
the shimmer of your dreams.
Asin, in your memory and honor
visible now we walk.