After Eden. Harold J. Recinos

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СКАЧАТЬ home on earth. here on this corner

      where indifference habitually makes

      its bed frail dark bodies crying from

      afar are rarely asked to give witness.

      on the streets where hands are joined

      by the poor dressed with bells like lepers,

      there will be no rest until the bitter wells

      are sealed tight and the high-minded blather

      is thrown into fiery depths!

      The Protest

      I knew the time would

      come to take up the poor’s

      quarrel at City Hall, talk with

      vigils to elected officials about

      the bare bones economy scarcely

      putting roofs over our heads and

      dread on kitchen plates. I knew

      the time would come to fling harsh

      Spanglish words in the bright light

      of day till Angels came looking brown

      like us with beautifully spread

      wings to make the deaf politicians

      walk down the municipal steps

      to listen. I knew the time would

      come to lean on the shut doors

      locked with the bullshit spinners

      inside of them and open them wide

      enough to break their hinges—that

      time is now!

      Factory Work

      the toy factory where

      his mother went to work

      was then the only place

      hiring broken English

      girls with sleepy brown

      eyes and dark faces born

      on someone else’s land.

      she assembled toys with

      smiles peeking each day

      through her lips, and making

      defamatory gestures behind

      the white foreman’s back who

      had thick disorderly hands. one

      afternoon the girls drenched in

      tears who had the good sense to

      join a labor union went on strike

      to fight like gods to win their living

      wages and safer times on the assembly

      lines. they even said the strike was

      the kind of prayer Jesus heard loud

      and clear enough to make him take a

      stand against the dreaded boss’s fingers

      that rested too often on their Puerto

      Rican hips. for years she worked in

      the toy factory listening each day to her

      broken English making sweet sounds like

      the grandmothers who came to America

      young to give children their best made

      dreams. one day without prior notice,

      the mother realized these kids feed oatmeal

      before school were living a history better

      than her years spent wrinkling in a South

      Bronx factory.

      The Raid

      this morning last night’s

      workplace raid is over, the

      waiters are busy sweeping

      sidewalks in the dim light

      of a broken moon, a new day

      starts them thinking about

      rounded up friends in federal

      cages who for thousands of

      miles will sing the beauties

      they are denied and the foul

      ignorance bruising them once

      again. frightened, the locked

      up call out, bitter tears dropping

      to the jail cell floor from their

      brown cheeks, their lungs inhaling

      the stale air that discloses the hate

      chiseling grave stones in the dark

      with Spanish names. the customers

      start arriving for a first meal and

      the waiters left behind wonder how

      long the country will feed on lies

      carefully wrapped like bible story

      gifts!

      The Spot

      I sat behind the little park tree

      like it was in the rain forest in

      the ascending light of a chilly

      morning. the Fort Apache police

      parked their car next to СКАЧАТЬ