Vivarium
I heard they might have wild bird seed.
Entering the place where, once upon a time,
I took the kids to gape with simple wonderment
at captive reptiles, I walk through towering aisles,
stacked with containers, glass-fronted, sawdust-
floored, each one lit with a single surrogate sun.
I wander, moody as a cloud, past black cauldrons
labeled “crickets,” “mice,” “chicks,” “frogs.”
At my shoulder, a dazzling green sailfin lizard,
silver pearls on her haunch, regal upon her throne,
gazes at me. An iguana moves to catch my eye.
Time seems to stop. These lost creatures stare,
tell how they were pulled from their burrows,
stuffed into sacks by the millions, ferried across
the equator of otherness to these dark cages. I turn
to the albino ball python, folded upon herself.
She stretches her long smooth neck up the seam
between plastic wall and glass window, small pink
tongue trembling at the narrow gap, to get a breath
of air. I place my finger next to the rift dividing free
from unfree, hoping she might feed upon my scent.
She moves in a little closer, ruby eyes glittering.
Gold Wing
This constant lying is not aimed at making the people believe in a lie, but at ensuring that no one believes anything anymore. –H. Arendt
In the city at night I hear them working,
moving machinery, on the new roundabout,
the men, up at three, wives fixing coffee,
frying pupusas, packing their lunch tins.
I hear the possum snuffling under rocks,
crackling the dry leaves. I lie in the dark
thinking how politicians making stuff up
could turn the young generation off the vote.
Meanwhile, what’s real is getting up to build
a road, a causeway, for the people. Build,
therefore, your own world, said Emerson.
Today I see an ant carrying a moth wing
ten times her size. As I watch, the wing
becomes a stiff sail catching the wind,
tumbling the ant backward again and again
over the yard, vast sea with no horizon.
She never lets go of the bright gold wing.
City Called Heaven
I made it to the station.
The platform was long,
a plank without a train.
How had I missed it?
Three men headed
toward me, staring.
I knew they meant
harm, meant it for me.
Where could I run?
There was a door,
I opened it and fled
down endless halls.
There was a room.
A woman hid me.
But they found me,
freezing my heart.
I kept on running,
heard the wind cry
Mary, mother of god,
and whoever else
might come to save.
I opened more doors,
took stairs up and down,
running on, begging
to wake up, through
hollow streets, alone,
under tall buildings,
seeking another city,
the city called heaven.
