I prefer red chile over my eggs
and potatoes for breakfast.
Red chile ristras decorate my door,
dry on my roof, and hang from eaves.
They lend open-air vegetable stands
historical grandeur, and gently swing
with an air of festive welcome.
I can hear them talking in the wind,
haggard, yellowing, crisp, rasping
tongues of old men, licking the breeze.
......
1.
Oh yes, friend! I'm crazy-
that's just the way I am.
2.
I see sounds,
I hear sights,
I taste smells,
I touch not heaven but things from the underworld,
things people do not believe exist,
......
I come from a musical place
Where they shoot me for my song
And my brother has been tortured
By my brother in my land.
I come from a beautiful place
Where they hate my shade of skin
They don't like the way I pray
And they ban free poetry.
......
I.
I dream of you walking at night along the streams
of the country of my birth, warm blooms and the nightsongs
of birds opening around you as you walk.
You are holding in your body the dark seed of my sleep.
II.
This comes after silence. Was it something I said
......
All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful,
The Lord God made them all.
Each little flower that opens,
Each little bird that sings,
He made their glowing colours,
He made their tiny wings.
......
An island sunset, when mango moon is calling,
Lush palm fronds sway, when the day is stalling.
Ivory tailed comet, comes but once in a lifetime,
Sitting in tropical sunset, at just the right time.
Gemmed hummingbird sparkle. Destiny dreams.
Pink sun is roving. Glossy crows' feathers gleam.
What was left behind, is often recalled to mind;
Yet, plum fate isn't unkind, as love again you find.
Julian and Joan were married, just as glitter is joined to crystal sun.
Julian was a famous violinist, like redbirds making music, in season.
Joan had a variety of elegant shoes. Of them, she was rightly proud.
Like seagulls of lakes and sky, whom liberty makes scream out loud!
The Halls were very busy people, like smoky shadows, ever moving;
And mornings were most hectic, like windblown petals, disapproving.
Flowering ferns graced their country house, when old friends came;
......
pastel spring's coming
ushered in by fresh fragrance
lemon blooms sunning
posh pink flowers peep
pearl snowdrops left with the clouds
blue roses still sleep
buttercups, lilacs
green ivy resumes its creep
......
Ruffly and pretty
in the colors of warm bliss
Windblown and silly
Young and with life, so giddy
Walled garden in the city
blue is wild iris
like the skies of racy clouds
or berries that tempt
sunshine's companion
since mulberry hours of dawn
when scents greeted song
carefree is iris
like warm wind, whistling all day
......