Among the Tufa
In one aeon,
the sentinels
have risen up
from the salty azure waters,
and crouch, ready to spring up
along the shore. Warped,
craggy and roman-colored,
they warm underneath
the hesitant touch
of our
carefully placed fingers
as we navigate
our way through the
stately columns. Their pumice
surface bleeds us
dry of inarticulated rage,
preparing us for the silence
that descends like a twilight
upon our souls.
Nothing can
be heard, and I fear I've gone
deaf, though I can sense the
palpable beating of waves
on the shore, the brush of birds'
wings against the wind, the
weave of your jacket against
my arm. You nurse the
wintery injury on your right hand,
gone numb from a recent
impulse to satisfy your fledgling
curiousity. Our eyes meet, and I
hear the whisper of your smile
echo around us, and my
panic subsides.
We sit on a bench
watching the sun hike
over the Sierras, and
the birds slice
through the air on invisible
whims. Our time for
solitude is drawing to a close,
but our peace remains
undisturbed, even as we backtrack
to your vehicle, and depart
a little more wistful than we came.
Sweet Peas
You are
so whimsical
with your profundity
transcending
from maiden pink
into elderly lavender twilight
in the space of a day.
I realize
there is nothing
more candid
than your
dessicated pale tendrils
spiraling
into themselves,
as a final prayer of thanks
for living the dream of
one stretch of life
perfectly undisturbed.
echo park
I'd meet her often
at the corner of Sunset and Alvarado,
by the lotus beds, or walking down Morton Drive.
She'd push a stroller,
with stoic, graceful determination,
she and her friends together in groups of two and three,
a parade of youthful, weary motherhood.
Softened thighs
in tighter-than-tight jeans,
her elegant, tattooed neck
beads sweat
from carrying a small boy in her arms,
sticky with soda and granules
from a tired churro clutched
in his greedy little hands.
Angry heat rises
while she searches for her erstwhile man,
and only heightens her dusky beauty,
as she is left
to shoulder the task of raising
another generation
of displaced warriors
alone.
Shabby hipsters gawk,
suburban values at odds
with their calculated slumming.
An abuela's seamed face
bobs up and down,
with the dim recollection
of the same role in earlier days;
just accepted, but never discussed.
The vatos smile,
advocate,
"Tradition, tradition,
down through the years
it carries on like before,"
while she holds her head high
above the entropy of Echo Park,
kisses her baby's cheek,
and whispers a promise
of escape
into her baby's ear.
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