Bringing Down the Wall / Hole in the Flag

Bringing Down the Wall/ Hole in the Flag

I.                    Bringing Down the Wall

The one

Moment

Cynosure

Pickax

It was inevitable

The tide of time couldn’t stop

The sea of people surged

Dirty taxicab

Smokers in trenchcoats

Sprayed haircuts and Hope, capital H, a heartbroken history

As a girl I pressed its grey texture in my hands, used to feel every bump and crag in it, that magickal concrete

Knew, but knew not knowing, through the veil of time and space

I held

Just a rock

And also the entire world.


II.                 Hole in the Flag*

It was a representation of power void
“It’s all too complicated for you to understand.”
At that age there could be good guys and bad guys.
It was what The People were searching for
Eyes in front, eyes in back
A survivor’s hypervigilance.
Soft sleep now
“The problems of our forebears are not ours;
We are free.”

So we put our hands through
Found mirror-us on the other side
Same shit, different shovel
The absolute corruption of power
“Which team do you play for?”

All the while, the hole got bigger.
Some spat out unremembered cautions
I’ve seen this movie before
And tried to change its ending.

In the dark of night
Only your heartbeat and the sense of being followed are real.
In the tunnel of niche-marketed illusions
We lost our humanity.

All the while, the hole got bigger.
Is hope visible through it?
Ask the naked question.

November 2018
*See A. Codrescu

Santa Annas

Santa Annas

Looking deep into fleshly faces

During the time of dry, spirit-filled airs

and screens only.

Meatspace is now uncanny.

A hillside fire consumes.

The ancestors are with us--

In our wrinkles, our laughter, our foibles, our prejudices.

Now we are an electronic parody

Of past

and regressive, recycled present.

The time of the Old Ones in Power is closing, as they shake with rage and terror

sucking all they can from us, like the illusions and headaches of Santa Ana winds.

Some leaves fall, others disintegrate on the branch.

10/12/18

Macroaggressions

Macroaggressions

I often think of my great-uncle

Who died, witnessed by his own

Executed by friendly fire;

The least-paradoxical of paradoxes.

I am actually

the most

the very most

the ultimate best, #blessed

thankful

for my ancestors who

raped

murdered

and killed

Because they gave me things to choose against

(On a good day.)

5/11/18

Old and Ugly

I feel like all I do is channel my dead Bunica lately.

OLD AND UGLY
Who cares if you are old and ugly
Who cares if I am old and ugly
Who cares if people think that about you
I am old, I was old, and wanted to die
Without our husbands we are nothing.
Who cares
All the love and all the money.
Old Woman is the most powerful
The more teeth are falling out the more they love you
No man owns me
No man will own me
Drink this drink
Take this pill
At this age they take care of you.
Have children before you starve
No one is ever going to want to marry you.
These are the refrains we tell ourselves to survive
The news is awful and they come to me in their folk costumes
I will be joining them shortly

I leave behind a world torn apart by lust and ignorance.

All the love and all the money.
3.14.18