El Paso, the pass unforgiving sand and sun but at peace with itself, strangely across a thin ribbon of river from red blood ****** on Juarez streets I roamed in my strutting youth now we are all sixty plus or minus one or two and afraid to cross the border whether it leads to a flashing frenzy of staccato notes that finish our song or a slow dance on the killing floor
written June 2011, inspired by my recent trip to El Paso, Texas, USA, a city separated only by a narrow river from the treacherous Ciudad Juarez, Mexico's death capital, which sadly boasts a ****** rate that rivaled Baghdad during the height of the Iraqi war--oddly enough El Paso had a ****** rate about half the USA national average and about 1-2% of Juarez, its sister city