WEBVTT

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Thank you very much.

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Great turnout.

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This is my first time in Tucson.

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And I already learned one very
important lesson about Tucson.

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Ah, don't pet the cactus.

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[LAUGHTER]

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I tried to get one of
those prickly pears,

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and instead I ended up with
a two handfuls of spines,

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I believe is the word.

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So if you see me
grabbing at my fingers

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during the course of the
reading, I'm not hallucinating.

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Or if you hear me shriek during
the course of the reading,

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it is not performance art.

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It's cacti.

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I suppose I was
trying to figure out

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what the equivalent would be.

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The equivalent, I guess,
of someone from Arizona

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going to Grand Central
Station in New York

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and giving their
bags to a stranger.

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That's where I'm from.

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I'm from Brooklyn, New York.

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And I'm going to start off
the reading by, basically,

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talking about the two
worlds that I inhabit,

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which is the world of New
York City, where I'm from,

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and the world of Puerto Rico,
where my family is from.

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And I'll begin with
the Brooklyn poem.

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This is a poem from
an earlier book, which

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was published by
Bilingual Review Press,

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out at Arizona State University.

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And the poem is based
on a childhood memory.

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It's a memory of a march through
the streets of my neighborhood,

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the East New York
section of Brooklyn.

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I was 9 or 10 years
old at the time.

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And what I recall are candles--

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people lighting
candles in the rain,

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and lighting them again when
they were put out by the rain--

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all in honor and in memory
of a short order cook

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named Agripino Bonilla, who
was murdered in East New York

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section of Brooklyn, in 1966.

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The poem is called "The Moon
Shatters on Alabama Avenue."

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"A wooden box rattled
with coins for the family

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on a stoop where the roots
of a brown blood stain grew.

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Brooklyn, 1966.

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Agripino Bonilla was his name.

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A neighbor, the
yellow leaflet said.

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A kitchen worker who walked
home under the scaffolding

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of the trains at night,
hurrying past street lamps

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with dark eyes.

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He was there when the
boys surrounded him,

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quick with shouts and pushing,
addictions hunger in a circle.

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When he had no money,
the kicking began.

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The mourners clustered
at the storefront, then

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marched between cadaverous
buildings down Alabama Avenue,

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as the night turned
blue with rain

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in a heavy sky of
elevated track.

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The first candle
struggled-- smothered, wet.

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Onlookers leaned
warily as they watched.

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A community of faces
gathered and murmured

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in the dim circles of light,
kept alive by cupped hands.

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In the asphalt streets
shined black from rain,

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in windows where
no one was seen,

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hesitant candles appeared.

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A pale blur started
on the second floor.

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Another trembling glimmer
slipped to the back

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of the march, then more.

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Multiplied into a
constellation, spreading

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over the sidewalk,
a swarm of candles

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that throb descending
tenement steps

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in the no longer absolute
dark, as if the moon had

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shattered and dropped
and burning white pieces

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on the night.

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His name was Agripino Bonilla.

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Spoken remembering
every $60 week

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he was bent in the kitchen,
his children who could not

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dress for winter and
brawl against welfare

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taunts at the schoolyard.

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The unlit night that
the sweep of legs

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was stopped by his
belly and his head.

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And the grief of thousands
illuminated city blocks,

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moving with the tired
feet of the poor.

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Candles a reminder of the
wakes too many and too soon,

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the frustrated prayers
and pleading with saints,

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in memoriam, for generations
of sacrificed blood,

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warm as the wax sticking
to their fingers.

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And years of broken street
lamps bowed with dark eyes

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or addictions hunger
waits nervously.

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Over the wooden
box, a woman's face

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was slick in a drizzle of tears.

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Her hand dropped
coins like seed."

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So that's Brooklyn.

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