When the hinges on the door open and the windows too leave their frame, and all that is about and around is the night’s sultry dark
Remember that the warmth of possibility
is the infinite count of stars above, always endless and shining for you–

beauty is a hinge of words that then becomes a ray passing through the window, glistening bright, the golden bowls over the table are full.

a swallow flew by
in early morning hours
i  asked it to fly under
your chin and lift it
if ever it was down
or if  the words of another
became torrential rain
that they may lend you
the oil on their wings
so that all which
could dampen you
slides off

Don’t make me an urn, make me a botellon de Barro for water.

Tell me as many times as you want that I should make a coffin, I will still make the frame of my bed first
, and over it, I will make love. I will make love

I pick goldenrod flowers to put in water, a smile calling joy.  
I open a bag of obleas de amaranto and crack one in half to make the meaningful.
I sit on a mat with a window overlooking pine trees, watching every sorrow and happiness shimmer over my green needles of experience while accepting I am just an observer watching through my eyes’ windows.

I will listen attentively as you knock on my door to propose a walk on a rainy day in sneakers and a light windbreaker. Heart, I will walk even if you take me through the mud.And if you can slow your pace and let me sit to look at the droplets collect on a common dandelion in my soaked hair & the wrong attire, then I promise you I will slug it out with you, my heart.

Coriander on a small rotating counter rack
    Left foot first with a smile
         Unless there is a fire in which case get the
Emergency fire extinguisher and try to put the
Simmering fire of such a young girl's
c
l
u
e
l
e
s
s
n
e
s
s  omewhere where it does not hurt

I have taken all parts you have given:
your small brown feet and your mastery of words, the way you danced and the way you fed those you loved, adding salt to the molcajete, adding prayer to the skies: I practice every day, come good, come bad. come a revolt of words: i show my face

There is one green mat by the window
my brother, my mother and I use it

Behind it is a window with a old red pine
i watch its needles under the evening light

each of us arriving on the rubber surface for a need to stretch the body and the heart

Your world is as wide as eternity, looping over and over again. The constellations keep birthing light, and all things are bursting, brimming: all bears life. How do you tell them this?

i knew the wind blew too strong
in your direction, that it took and kept
taking from you, i did not want to pry

i knew the worst boiled different
from the last and this one bent
your vision, and blew out your lamp

in you i knew, there was a soft hand
i tried to remember this after each reproach
that there was that friend, that man

i loved somewhere in the midst of that night
i knew i couldn't do it right, but i tried

i keep a wrapper
tucked in the corner
of my wide-leg
jeans with a little
offering: a small
keychain dream
i can hang
from pair of keys

i wonder
   how long
it takes to rest
   before a sliver
summer
   must be
given into
  why can't kindness
be enough

somehow you could empathize with every other woman
left and right but not me,  not my eyes or the way i walked

or even tried to be warm in this wintry desolate situation
left and right but not here, i left and perhaps it was an angel

that carried me purposefully away

send it back to the robber barons
                                   tear it this behemoth of a bill
feed the poor and the helpless
                                  take care of the sickly and the old
send this bill back to the robber barons
                                   send its letters dark & black back to the inkwell
protect our public lands and our natural gems from sale
                                   say no to these robber barons
say "no" say "no more, robber barons! "

geez, i cannot see a road to you. every time
i took to it, knocked on your door, the flood came,

and after i garnered the courage to take the same
path, a wildfire in your eyes broke out.

the third time i tried, time became an earthquake
ravaging through the city of my life.

everything shook, burned, and inundated. now
i cannot take any more ground failures

and disappearing roads. you are there, and i am here,
and there is a respective sea

of silence in-between us,  even though i do love you,
i stand in front of a landslide, muddied and hurt

me listening to Jesse Welles and crying is my new vibe,

crying because i'm sad, crying because I'm moved, crying--

my round full cheeks have given way
to hollows that reveal my grandmother’s cheekbones

my hair curls and no longer waves
to hint at my fathers curls

And in my coastal home town  the sun has consistently appeared through every season bringing back a slight clustering of freckles over the bridge of my nose with an array of recent sun spots over my upper lip and at my temples

My left wisdom tooth against all odds decided to exit in my thirties and push my teeth forward; I have a different smile now

while a new circular mole has appeared under my right eye. naturally I begin to look like someone different. Don’t know if  my body is a new temple breaking from the past or if it’s honoring it by stitching me closer to those that came before

I like the quiet way that life yields itself to its own tongue or torso tripping on its own soles when it hits a sidewalk
how clumsy can be poetic and you can laugh even after you fall as long as you are in good company

you walk
no matter the direction
this dream
      never changes much
they put their foreheads
to yours And smile

in some they are wolves
that sleep at your side

in others travelers
that gather
with you in the forest

in others they
   point toward a tiger
lurking in your chest

you walk
        and they protect
nothing is wild

        (not even a dream)

why are you doing this
       the longest day of summer of has come
and you inch towards the darkness

arresting migrants off the street
       law you call it, crime you name it
to flee for refuge somewhere else

why are you doing this
       there is a refugee, a cave lion, a tiger,
a jaguar who traveled far & wide

they are not weak; they are not alone
       you cover your face and take them
but one day when the light is the shortest cat

out in the alley watching
          this unlit terror fade the tribunals
will begin and they will knock

at your door looking for Schutzstaffel
          & the camp garrison
and ask you why were you doing that?

I should have told you that there were no coves to run to on this beach’s coast; when I think of you, there is only sadness. The waves crash and the rocks are all ragged, what you hide is yours forever, your responsibility—it isn’t my boat or oar to tend to and maintain

warheads and bombers
      are tied clatterings
of just-married cans tying us to war
again

Diplomacy should have married
the bride, but here we are
to war again

Someone steal the bride
someone make the picket signs

For I, too, refuse
to go to war

This little ribbon of lost meets


the slender and wide ribbon of remembrance.  


all children are ours.        


  All people are worthy of respect


when you can open your eyes again,



       even to stare into someone else’s pained eyes or even your own


                            you can tell


that there is room for compassion,


        there is certainly room

for grace

little well of a heart how full it gets when it rains
and your am not prepared to drink  

i saw the news today and I wept again; it had to spill somehow
all these horrid ribbons of pain well over in a stranger eyes

human dignity is buoyant and the sacred heart of christ is still
in the west bank

I see the home depot I grew up driving to, the one next regal, behind that cinema is a swap-meet where I used to dig for old records as a teen.  

I see and They came to the place where I most often saw the LA river, they barged into every memory I have and sprinkled their terror rounding up community members with families. Rounding folks trying to make a dime. I have driven down Alondra street more times than I can count.

I see that you have come for my heart but it’s already taken full of chants  Viva el immigrante, long live the immigrant, si de puede, el Pueblo unido jamas sera Venicido.

You have made me stronger in my conviction and my values. Thank you!

No nos desampares en el corazón de nuestras oraciones extiende tu mano y toma nuestra voluntad y devoción al amor por nuestros prójimos cesa la sed y el miedo y como la flecha a la marca impulsa los hacia adelante y aquí en nuestro hogar reine el amor pues tanto mal no puede ser todo lo que hay. Madre nuestra, querida luz de la luces, abrazo a nuestra ciudad con tu manos y ternura.

the S W A T team and L A P D cleared
the way for w h i t e sterile vans to advance
slowly through the crowd of filming spectators  towards the factory and take the workers inside

the family members with mothers,
brothers and fathers  inside rushed
to block the entrance

the S W A T threw canisters at the folks
standing on the sidewalks nearby but its foul
smell that made the bystanders cough could not mask

that unless these officers, these servicemen these agents are Tongva/ Gabrieleño in downtown L . A 
 they are just  I M M I G R AN T S  arresting I M M I G R AN T S

You who came on ships to this continent, you whose family ached for a beginning. I ask you to stand in front of your ancestors as they reached  for promise & solace on this land and ask them to leave at the dock.  Why are your immigrant roots more legitimate than any others? Why should it be ? Is it because you enslaved bodies to built your wealth, or stole land from others to construct your suburbs if this is the reason you claim this land to be yours
what glory are you defending?

I have started saying "I don't know"
when they ask on what page it's on
Although I know, I have begun not answering
question and letting silence take to the air
but I know the response,  mentors
friends and life have so kindly given to me
the letter with the answers, I don't want to pretend
to be dull-witted--I do know
it's all blood and scrapes and great heaps of
love to know, not haughtiness --

the silence of a library in summer
is pleasing
one pencil's drop is as deep
as an ocean
its sound ebbing towards my shore
of attention
from one end of the room to other the shadow
of people gone
only a custodian and his keys celebrate
this momentous occasion

genocide. on a strip. because the rest of was taken years ago-
fear & anger dominate the bombs. where is your clear mind?
people are people. violence is a crime. where is your compassion?

I am trying to walk this way
north, towards the northern star
but i do not care to arrive at the northern star
I simply look for what is in that direction

I weep with my little pains huddled
like toddlers around me.  
They were so sweet
in their patience with me, waiting
until I was ready. Now I hold them,
their tiny faces giddy with excitement, as I abandon
the ground of functionality for a wilderness
quiet at their side

its in the practice of little devotions
that everything we dig up
can be turned into treasure
or at least a map of where to
or where to not find it

Someone is ringing the bell; I no longer know who they are but I feel the clapper’s reverberation.

I wish you all the happiness of a spring yielding to summer braver, old friend. Please understand I mean no harm.

Things your eyes say:


Your eyes are beautiful, not because of their color or their shape, but because of their gleam as you tilt your head closer and embrace the person next to you.
I know you understand the gift of a small kindness, of a well-meaning "hello,"  and that is why your eyes captivate me with their soft syrup sweetness. They seem doused in sincerity, and it shows. No human makes it to this field of kindliness without crossing the mud moats of pain, but you awoke today and chose warmheartedness' aromatic nectar. And the world reaps its benefit

I am loved. the sun that rose over the brushes
up until it climbed the trunk of a magnolia tree
giggling swung past the thick petals of its flowers
and set off into the open sky.

the conclave is over and the smoke has risen white what are we to do with all this possibility, what are we to do but take into our hands

new
        intentional
                             heartwarming
                                                    ­   family before art
                                                             ­   two drinks sibling chat
                                              while singing & trying to match pitch    
                              buying cempasuchil with ma
                my nieces as MOA & Hair Artist (I never escape their birthday parties without proper styling by their 5 years old hands)
all the silliness I can muster, because we won't be making it our of this life alive
everything else for the world
   the door of the heart open for charming
           the mind ready for growing
                  thoughts like arrow on the positive
                        always a new place to see
                             whatever, shall I do ... find a new album
                             find a new book ...find a beginning or some
                            


                                 ­                                                           


                                                   beginnings

You were right about my many educations. Each language, with its treasure and its blindspots, has left me needing more opening
more traveling and more meetings with new people; nothing is static-

I lit a candle so that in this corner, when it might be easy to despair for the world, there may still be light. That much I can do.

The stars still race upwards towards the night and the moon still follows you while you are driving in your car, whatever is here is as  profound as ever, tonight is best to find a silly reason to smile and laugh together

si crees que no te entiendo lo suficiente
para quererte esta bien

no hay ningún pasillo del cual yo quisiera recurrir para hacerte entender

si tengo que ser igual que tú en toda manera entonces eres tú

el que no sabe de querer pues nada en esta vida es igual y yo tampoco

I look at old photographs of picturesque
places we’d traveled to together our faces teeming with a burgeoning smile
that is locked and keyless over pixels
that remain unchanged by time they so dutifully remind me that we used
be together and happy within this gallery of sorts

I am no longer
what you wished
me to be
when the flurry
of the wind comes
to brush my hair
I let it

each of the seedling kindnesses you plant
every small deed you do lives like a
giant redwood year after you're gone--
all your goodwill skipping over time's
lengthy lake to ripple