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My father liked them separate, one there,
one here (allá y aquí), as if aware

that words might cut in two his daughter’ s heart
(el corazón) and lock the alien part

to what he was — his memory, his name
(su nombre) — with a key he could not claim.

“English outside this door, Spanish inside,”
he said, “y basta.” But who can divide

the world, the word (mundo y palabra) from
any child? I knew how to be dumb

and stubborn (testaruda); late, in bed,
I hoarded secret syllables I read

The Ballad of the Harp Weaver

“Son,” said my mother,
When I was knee-high,
“You’ ve need of clothes to cover you,
And not a rag have I.

“There’ s nothing in the house
To make a boy breeches,
Nor shears to cut a cloth with
Nor thread to take stitches.

“There’ s nothing in the house
But a loaf-end of rye,
And a harp with a woman’ s head
Nobody will buy,”
And she began to cry.

That was in the early fall.
When came the late fall,
“Son,” she said, “the sight of you
Makes your mother’ s blood crawl, –

Violent Rooms

1.

The contours of the girl blur. She is both becoming and fact.
A rancor defines the split. Rip into. Flatten the depth of voice. That

urgent flex peels off the steady layers. A girl, I say.
Girl. Gu-erl. Quell. He. He — unbuttons before emergence.

As in yard rake pressed to roof of mouth. A fragrant rod.
Suh — sssuh — ssuck. Insistence. Lips go lisp. Our brutish boy.

Having not ever been whole. Or simple. Or young. Just split and open.
Not of it. For it. Born a cog of hard wheel at five, six, seven...

[Dear one, the sea... ]

Dear one, the sea smells of nostalgia. We’ re beached and bloated, lie
on shell sand, oil rigs nowhere seen. It’ s Long Island, and the weather
is fine. What to disturb in the heart of a man?

A boy is not a body. A boy is a walk.

Shed the machine.
Must be entirely flesh to fight.
Must be strategy instead of filling.

And, the Last Day Being Come, Man Stood Alone

And, the last day being come, Man stood alone
Ere sunrise on the world’ s dismantled verge,
Awaiting how from everywhere should urge
The Coming of the Lord. And, behold, none

Did come, — but indistinct from every realm
Of earth and air and water, growing more
And louder, shriller, heavier, a roar
Up the dun atmosphere did overwhelm

His ears; and as he looked affrighted round
Every manner of beast innumerable
All thro’ the shadows crying grew, until
The wailing was like grass upon the ground.

The New Decalogue

Have but one God: thy knees were sore
If bent in prayer to three or four.

Adore no images save those
The coinage of thy country shows.

Take not the Name in vain. Direct
Thy swearing unto some effect.

Thy hand from Sunday work be held —
Work not at all unless compelled.

Honor thy parents, and perchance
Their wills thy fortunes may advance.

Kill not — death liberates thy foe
From persecution’ s constant woe.

Kiss not thy neighbor’ s wife. Of course
There’ s no objection to divorce.

“Que Sera Sera”

In my car, driving through Black Mountain,
North Carolina, I listen to what
sounds like Doris Day shooting
heroin inside Sly Stone’ s throat.

One would think that she fights
to get out, but she wants to stay
free in this skin. Fresh,
The Family Stone’ s album,

came out in ’73, but I didn’ t make sense
of it till ’76, sixth grade for me,
the Bicentennial, I got my first kiss that year,
I beat up the class bully; I was the man.

The Flash Reverses Time

When I’ m running across the city
on the crowded streets
to home, when, in a blur,
the grass turns brown
beneath my feet, the asphalt
steams under every step
and the maple leaves sway
on the branches in my wake,
and the people look,
look in that bewildered way,
in my direction, I imagine
walking slowly into my past
among them at a pace
at which we can look one another in the eye
and begin to make changes in the future
from our memories of the past —
the bottom of a bottomless well,

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