"The Feet on the Head."
"It is always good to have feet on the head, my Taita says,
so your footsteps shall never go blind."
This one's called "I Did Not Say Anything, Just Thought."
"Those feathers that the Taita carries on his head
made me think about the death of the guacamayo bird.
The Taita that ambled ahead of me approached me and said--
I did not kill it.
I found it in the place of the singing birds.
It was my offering to acquire the power of divining.
Then he walked away."
"Calyx."
This is my own poem.
"Kneeling before the altar of your hands you close your eyes
and listen to wooden sunbeams splinter dirt floors
into peninsulas of ice, each crackle--
a fissure blooming dove wings fluttering
past the stone on which you sharpened your teeth,
as if cornering the wolves snarling
when you asked to leave your hair bandaged would shut
windows open to green pastures and plume your palm
with brown skin.
Amber barn light flashes upon orange rinds worming
through the cow's skull, ivory read
columns of smoke followed by silk curtains
billow from our eyelids, scattering snow
over the cliff edge, we know for some reason, reason was here.
The night, our corn fields glittering backdrop,
splatters the wind chill and we are flung back towards dust,
our minds forked with spilled ink tasting like turtle blood
under our hushed bodies.
How do I describe her daubing my face with a cornhusk?"