Atlas

Atlas on the cross in the pit of my stomach, a ditch just like Sisyphus’, makes his march to the capital for his crucifixion through an acidic wasteland. A grotesque shimmering mirror ball of a world on his shoulders, soldiers of suffering shove his stress-induced gastrointestinal crown of thorns deeper
into the delicate pink contours of his brow as a way to keep things moving, the jerk
of a master on a leash. Spearhead of aspirin in his side tears a teardrop-shaped hole
that dribbles blood all ruddy to the earth being torn by a wooden post
dragged ever so slowly. Chained to a sphere revolting, not revolving, brutal and stygian.

Heading north this time, up and away from the eventual Golgotha of lower entrails, footprints of ash and fire up a weathered twenty seven year old esophagus, each an imprint of bipedal lava flow, each a reason to double over on one’s axis, to collapse out of orbit, in on oneself as the implosion siphons drifting debris, taking neighboring astral bodies out in the wake of a black hole of loathing all things biological and metaphysical.

One universe and its fate trapped inside of every single living body. Cells, particles waiting for their day of reckoning and atonement. For what purpose, what sins have been occasioned to coincide with such a processional of foe, fear and dread? Cloaked darksiders, pallbearers of hope, of trust, of the lust that makes life worth living trail this walking sarcophagus like animals sated on carrion flesh. They come! Roguish centurions, black-hearted well-wishers lowering the drawbridge of my mouth. Just like that, they cast him out into a porcelain abyss and I can’t say I’m relieved.

El Duende de la Lámpara

You’ve got no soul, when you’re the only guero on the block.
Mi duende es la puta. Kids with first names like Andres, last names like Aguilar
in the line for the shower in junior high, towels act as shanks. ¿Donde esta mi duende?
Lil’ Frankie and some baldheads jump you for pennies in front of a church. ¿Adonde vas, mi duende?

Girls, who smell like Aquanet, think you’re weird. ¿En mis manos? They come to school wearing lingerie as outerwear. ¿En mis huesos o mi verga o mis huevos? Your grades in classes where you sit behind them start to slip. No yo se, mi duende. But their breasts are so round and so new that you can’t help it. Estamos en la alma del Dios. First names like Yesenia, last names like Benividez that you caress before bed under covers. No se, duende.

So lost in a pervasive size 48 Ben Davis on size 28 waist-culture that you buy into your otherness. ¿No comprende para mi duende, las hermanas de los pantalones de viajar? You discover subculture, which makes you more of a target. Sus sangre es el miel por los lobos del amores con Tres Flores. “You dress like a maricon, chingon.” An esé will say. No se duende, amigo. They’ll befriend if you fight back and tell you to watch movies like Blood In, Blood Out. No se duende, chon chon.

They’ll say you’re honorary Chicano and invite you to barbeques in the park.
Tengo hambre por los niños de la mañana. You’ll eat potato tacos and their tio will aid you in getting boracho. Fuiste mi duende por la fiesta. Abuelita will sit watching a novela with you and wonder how people come up with these kinds of plot lines. Vaya con monos, mi duende.

Signal Hill Blues

Gentle leaf trickles apertly down Willow
near a swiftly bending tree branch,
glitter shimmers softly off moist Cherry
to force, to break, to blow and burn
or make me new. Touched myself, rather mad,
seeming to attempt to yield, not to seek,
strive or find. I swell, my gourd plump
for winter, a question batters my heart for you
and yet you breathe to inform, to relate the absurd,
to truncate the observed shine. Now discontent
attacks crudely and toughly screaming a vulture,
who ponders loudly, near sharp actors
of a mummers’ play, of all the western stars,
until I die a pretty green up there, up there.