This poem-- I knew a gypsy, a European gypsy.
And his one aim in life was to be a South American dictator.
And so he said I was too naive for him.
So when he left, I read in the paper
they're having trouble in Bolivia,
and I think that's probably where he is now, OK?
[LAUGHTER]
So I got-- all my poems after that for a while
were just all about him.
But this house-- one paragraph is strong,
and I've cut it a lot and tried to make it better.
So I'll try it out on you.
It's called "Cuba, 1962."
"When the rooster jumps up on the windowsill
and spreads his red-gold wings, I
wake, thinking it is the sun and call
Juanita, hearing her answer, but only in my mind.
I know she was already outside, breaking the cane off
at ground level, using only her big Indian hands.
I get the machete and walk among the cane
until I see her, lying face down in the dirt.
Juanita, dead in the morning like this.
I raise the machete--
what I take from the Earth I give back--
and cut off her feet I lift the body
and carry it to the wagon, where I load the cane
to sell in the village.
Whomever tastes my woman in his candy, his cake,
tastes something sweeter than the sugar cane, it is grief.
If you eat too much of it, you want more,
you can never get enough."