After Eden. Harold J. Recinos

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ lifted the tenement six stories

      high. the wind laughed when it blew

      by the stoop where I sat in the rather

      hopeless eye-opening task that made

      people on the way to work slowdown

      to stare at me like a miracle was on its

      way. I restarted the count more than

      once, pausing until the restless sidewalks

      held still and the singing coming from

      the storefront church filled with brown

      feet for an old-fashioned time of praise,

      stopped. my thoughts wandered about

      that day making me feel like an actor in

      a Tennessee Williams play forgetting

      lines. without yielding a single inch,

      I kept counting those bricks expecting

      an accurate reading would deliver me

      to the mystical heaven so many talked

      about on the block. then, tired I stopped

      counting and promised to try some other

      time without stumbling on cracks and

      shades.

      The Shore

      in the thanksgiving month of

      November beyond the high

      thoughts perjuring history

      that make you gasp for air,

      kind hands reach for you from

      the aching depths known too well

      by strangers in this land troubled

      by mouths full of loathing. despite

      generations of knowing the nation’s

      rivers, mountains, oceans, forests,

      valleys and lakes, you are a stranger

      here, one of the many dispossessed

      of a place to call home, and your sweet

      dreams are curved by those in power to

      satisfy their English only wants. in the

      many months to come you promised to

      put away these days by having your truth

      carried by the wind to any public stage,

      where with elegant rage it will speak

      to say America is home!

      Resurrection

      in this light, you do not walk

      alone the long stony road, the

      blessings of the heavenly stars

      keep pace with the simplest joys

      that meet you and your unbearable

      tears. in this light, the church bells

      are loudly ringing with good news

      for a dirty world in need, with prophecies

      remembered, and life without harm. in

      this light, call out in the dark the saintly

      names, whisper to the unifying mystery

      that with firm clarity you know where to

      stand. with your clay feet, dance the entire

      length of life until you dive into the loving

      arms of God.

      Spanish Harlem

      I roamed around the city by

      riding her trains to places ten

      year old eyes had never seen

      way over on the side of town

      that never heard of dividing

      tracks. I roamed for years the

      streets of Spanish Harlem in the

      moonlight, looking for vanished

      friends, traces of a dead brother,

      collecting the storied dreams of

      dark kids who ran, played and lived

      in Spanglish where their world entirely

      began. after years of climbing over

      shady streets, I learned to stand quietly

      on the corner to watch the dreams that

      followed kids to school, grandmothers

      into church and old men to tattered seats

      carefully placed in front of Joey’s grocery

      store. I learned the words in school books

      carried around the city never coughed answers

      for spics. tell me, how long until we cross

      the river Jordan?

      Ivory Tower

      in the tower made of books

      surrounded by planted trees,

      beautiful flowers, and seeded

      grass, separated from barbarous

      clashing on the streets, scholars

      are busy measuring what God

      says on pages kept on shelves

      away from the poverty giving misery

СКАЧАТЬ