The elephants are dancing on the ballroom floors
prim as pachyderms can possibly be.
They are flaunting their tusks jovially about
and stepping on no one's feet.

The charlatans trace enigmatic scores
with their heel-toe trot around the beasts.
Each dip, each spin, a calculated route,
graceful and ever discrete.

Their skin, I've heard, is full of sores;
chafed by every whisper and nod.
The music is fading and shoulders are tense
listening to the hardwood creak.

Don't get me wrong;
I count it all blessing,
This one track mind,
The endless company.
I always deliver what they come seeking:
That sharp taste of thrill in the ceiling of their mouths.

I suppose every life has its ups and downs.
Each person their silver,
Each person their cloud.
But I have inhaled the heavens deep into my lungs
And they have made me sick.
They drift, seemingly, wherever they please.
I can tell you this:
I have never tasted the same cloud twice.
Each second they grow.
With each gust they float
Away from the moment's cares and all its trivialities.

I can still hear them,
Well-meaning enough to make me doubt my sanity,
'You are built for speed' -now go where we tell you.
'You are full of surprises' -that we planned meticulously.
I am stuck in this groove and it is nothing I can dance to.
The DJ has fallen asleep
And I am slowly blending into the wallpaper.

The first time I heard them screaming
It was like wedding cake and cannons,
Like listening to your son speak his first word
And recognizing it as your name.
They love what I do.
I hate how I do it.

I dream of stretching my long body across the sky,
Taking flight like a paper dragon,
Chasing rooftops and mountains,
Rolling down hills as soft as a mother's cheek.
There are words I long to write on the horizon
In script as wide as it is deep.
There is so much more i have seen than i have smelled.
There are screams I can give you
That wave their arms like white flags,
Waiting to be plucked from gardens
Just outside my reach.

I have been burying my anguish in the hearts of wooden trusses.
They push back against me when I am feeling down.
'Chin up, there go those screams again.'
They taste nothing like cake.
One more 3 minute episode.
I have been showing you reruns of smiles for the past two years,
Have you noticed?
But who is the servant to question the master?
I will keep my head down,
Drive the track I've been given,
And pretend I still enjoy the sunrise.

I wish I could keep from sleeping.
The dissonance of waking to the same routine
Is Schoenberg to my ears.
Every night it's the same thing:
My eyelids kiss this day goodbye
And it is some glorious tomorrow,
When I will finally get my chance
To scream.

"It's happening on a day when the DOW industrial average was already down 175 points."
- Adam Johnson, Bloomberg Television, covering the Boston Marathon bombing


One by one she piled them,
bodies and fragments,
broken and tattered,
onto the golden scale.

their hands and feet,
swollen with innocence,
fell lifeless as the eyes
of their adjudicator.

where is your soul,
Lady Liberty?
where is your god,
oh, Freedom?

cold gears creaked
as the balance swayed;
songs of the hand
that guides the machine.

what is the stock price
of flesh these days?
and does our ignorance
provoke or appease you?

Boston, it seems,
is filled with heavy streets.
Inciting the terror
of empty pockets.

When our death tolls
read like itemized deductions,
something has gone terribly wrong.

There is a doorway through which
life and death both passed,
shoulder to shoulder,
exchanging nothing
but a moment's glance
in silent accusation.

Death defeated,
Life restored;

Behold the thorn-crowned,
bleeding door
rising from futile tomb.

Go Tito, Go Tito
Go Tito, Go Tito
Go Tito, Go Tito
Mata los timbales
Go Tito

Go Tito, Go Tito
Go Tito, Go Tito
Go Tito, Go Tito
Mata los timbales
Go Tito

Oye como va...

the neighbors voices climbing out of windows left and right.

Is that you Tito?
Put down those pots and pans.
Make better use of those hands.
Don't you know those hands were made for working?
Follow your father to his factory grave shift,
Make razorblades to sell.
We'll always have hair on our faces.

Is that you Tito?
Knock off that racket.
Here I am trying to sleep
And you've got my feet to moving.
The night was made for dancing Tito,
And dancing was made for Harlem,
But that's bastante on a Wednesday mijo.

The young king packs up his studio,
Whistling dixie like she's never been whistled before.
Twirling the melody from royal lips,
Showing her how to use those God given hips.
Where did you find that groove you in your neck?
And do the words Puerto Rico still give you the chills?

You have walked on too many streets in New York City
And the Afro-beat is shacking up with the Cuban.
You can hear their children playing in the barrio allá,
And aquí they're blowing horns of imagination.
Make those wooden sticks tap your telegram, Tito.
Let the world know about this message brewing inside you.
They hate.
They yell.
They love to see you dancing,
But your ankles told you that wasn't right for you.
Your hands never have been able to keep still.
Maybe it's because they feel the future.
Do you realize where your bridge will lead?

You are the future Tito.
Do what you got to do to be where you got to be.
Play in Uncle Sam's band but don't you go to Normandy.
Follow your hands back to the big apple,
Take a bite out of this place they call Juliard.
When you sleep at night are they still screaming…
Go Tito, Go Tito
Go Tito, Go Tito
Go somewhere where the floor is on fire
With the fusion of jazz and samba.
Make it bigger Tito until it looks like it did in your dreams.
Pick up those sticks and mata los timbales.
Have the decency to wink when they name you king.

What is it that you mixed in that ***?
Your alchemy giving birth to new species.
Have mercy Tito.
Your music is feasting on the ears of the public,
Your hands are drumming on the ecosystem.
They call it salsa, and you laugh
Because they can't taste the carne.
Shine those pots and pans.
Tip your hat to Spanish Harlem,
Where windows stay open to let the dreamers dream big
And the red brick walls are soaked with memories.
Babarabatiri Tito,
Teach the world how to dance.

Go Tito, Go Tito
Go Tito, Go Tito
Go Tito, Go Tito
Mata los timbales
Go Tito

Oye como va...

a legend.

Come and rest a while young soldier.
Lay down your arms and sleep.
Your bones have battled your blood
has battled your lungs have battled your kidneys.
Come, take refuge, and weep.
On days you feel like the lines in the sand
originate somewhere in the palms of your hands
and trace your every vein,
when you can't shake the shellshocked feeling
of blood cell battle cries,
before your eyes wander distant,
come dream a while of peace.
Even God rests his mind once a week.

And on the road back to your body
that looks less like home
than where you you've imagined yourself to be,
stash a few visions of tomorrow in your pockets.
Eat them like candy.
Wake with the taste of hope on your teeth.
That golden-ventricled soldier you left standing guard
has picked up his drum once again.
March on to the rhythm of his faithful resolve
with a the song of revolution on your lips.
Rise up young patriot.
Fight tooth and nail.
Wear your flag on your skin.
Take aim at anything that tells you
you were born to be less than free.
March on into the morning,
each step taken
seizing peace.

I falsely remember gondola rides between the faces of your words
The sea that held them together harmonized with the serenade
You are Venetian by association.
You are an artist because of the tune you left humming in my ears