And my other hero--
and I hope many of you know his work as well--
the Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca,
dead at the hands of the thug Franco.
And in fact, his grave couldn't be found for many years.
It was recently found, and this poem refers to that.
I think, if I may say, of the Syrian poets tonight
cowering somewhere, hiding somewhere heroically
against thugs.
"Street of Dreams."
Whoever covered Garcia Lorca never
identified his shallow grave, but finally one summer
the mystery is told.
It turns out he's likely very nearby
as a red poppy with a black heart.
A field of him enchanted the site.
Until he was gathered, God as my witness, thrown into a sack,
and swung like a bag of cement into a trench
dug by some old soul seeking water in the countryside.
Huddling close by pomegranates or figs, and possibly lemons.
Almonds and olives too are not uncommon.
Far enough from the villages to be out of sight,
but you get there by car since they
would have needed headlights to shoot people at night.
A firing squad of career policemen and volunteer
executioners, half afraid for their own lives,
murdered three others and a poet for 500 pesetas.
One skank bragged, I gave that idiot a shot in the head.
Irony of ironies.
While you attract fireflies, gnats, and other pests
nearby your own head, a hacked melon of red flesh
sweetens an empty marketplace.