2 Poems

Alhambra, Granada, Spain

The rain without warning

breaks my reflection

into El Greco longevity,

eyes ascend long and thin

to heaven in flickering impressions.

A young girl dances solea,

hands tracing “Allah”

in Moorish calligraphy

over the heads

of swimming goldfish light.

God in the detail,

or a god in the detail?

Three young brothers pose in what

comes back from water

as the image of Brahma

four heads, four arms,

and Goya’s Saturn,

devouring offspring

and eternity.

There is no city

that devours eternity

like Granada.

Soon, all reflections disappear.

What remains are the senseless,

random turns of goldfish.

Hiding from lost house keys,

from curls fallen from homemade haircuts swirling on orange carpet,

from unplugged wires seeking their place in the galaxy,

from the baseball he can’t wrap his fingers around,

dropped and forgotten near the refrigerator in favor of a cherry popsicle,

from baby sister’s bottle nipple pointing towards the

fuse box that connects clean teeth to itchy fingers,

from the steak knives his mother left out on the kitchen table,

telling me to stay away,

from promises I could not keep thanks to my diabetes,

anxiety, insomnia, and cowardice,

from the puppy that scratched his hand last week in mutual excitement,

from last night’s fireworks outside his window

and the windless night carrying sulfur into today.

What is that humming sound coming from the kitchen sink,

my boy’s hiding place?

Come out, show yourself my son.

There is a cricket in the garage who wants to meet you.

His voice is the truce between the earlier explosions and the quiet.

Come my son, listen to the cricket, who keeps perfect time,

like your heart when the fear is gone.

I hope, for both our sakes, the next decade is not too loud.

I hope, for both our sakes, that time is kept perfectly.