My Wicked Wicked Ways: Poems

She lived mistress.

  Died solitary.

  There is as well

  the cousin with the famous

  how shall I put it?

  profession.

  She ran off with the colonel.

  And soon after,

  the army payroll.

  And, of course,

  grandmother’s mother

  who died a death of voodoo.

  There are others.

  For instance,

  my father explains,

  in the Mexican papers

  a girl with both my names

  was arrested for audacious crimes

  that began by disobeying fathers.

  Also, and here he pauses,

  the Cubano who sells him shoes

  says he too knew a Sandra Cisneros

  who was three times cursed a widow.

  You see.

  An unlucky fate is mine

  to be born woman in a family of men.

  Six sons, my father groans,

  all home.

  And one female,

  gone.

  OTHER COUNTRIES

  And at times we feel a little like exiles; a woman feels like that when she does not live up to the image of her required by the times, when she does not interpret it, and hence searches for paths, for other “countries” where life for her will be different from that in her own country, in the homeland given her by her mother’s womb.

  —MARIA ISABEL BARRENO, MARIA TERESA HORTA, AND MARIA VELHO DA COSTA, THE THREE MARIAS

  Letter to Ilona from the South of France

  for Ilona Den Blanken Nesti

  Ilona, I have been thinking

  and thinking of you since I went away,

  dragging you with me across the South of France

  and into Spain. Then back again.

  I ran away to an island off the coast,

  tiny jewels of fields beneath the jewel of sky—

  and lost myself one night in crumpled poppies.

  Odd for such a city poet like me

  to find such comfort in the dark—

  I who always feared it—and yet

  I loved the way it wrapped me like a skin.

  All those stars, Ilona. And wind.

  Field illumined by those poppies.

  Yes, that was good.

  I wanted to bring that back forever,

  wrap it in a velvet cloth to show you.

  The wind from Africa. The field of poppies.

  The way my bicycle hummed the distance.

  And for me, Ilona, who has never known

  the liberty of darkness, who has never

  let go fear, how do I explain a joy this elemental,

  simple like your daughter’s hand outlined in crayon.

  And yet I think you understand

  my first sky full of stars—

  you who are a woman—

  the wind from Africa, the field of poppies,

  the night I let slip from my shoulders.

  To wander darkness like a man, Ilona.

  My heart stood up and sang.

  Ladies, South of France—Vence

  At 4 P.M. the promenade begins.

  The wives who walk with husbands

  and the ones without

  who do not walk at all.

  They gather like dusty birds

  beneath their paisley

  and polka-dot

  and plaid and blue-checked

  and yellow and plum-colored

  parasols.

  And in their penny-whistle French

  each evening when the sunlight dims,

  they sing.

  December 24th, Paris—Notre-Dame

  The Seine runs along.

  Merrily, merrily.

  The river. The rain.

  Water into water.

  A blue umbrella fading into fog.

  A child into his mother’s arms.

  Buttresses leaping delirious.

  Wind through the vein of trees.

  The rain into the river.

  Tomorrow they might find a body here—

  unraveled like a poem,

  dissolved like wafer.

  Say the body was a woman’s.

  Ophelia Found.

  Undid the easy knot and spiraled.

  Without a sound.

  A year ends

  merrily. Merrily

  another one begins.

  I go out into the street once more.

  The wrists so full of living.

  The heart begging once again.

  Beautiful Man — France

  I saw a beautiful man today

  at the café.

  Very beautiful.

  But I can’t see

  without my glasses.

  So I ask the woman next to me.

  Yup, she says, he’s beautiful.

  But I don’t believe her

  and go to see for myself.

  She’s right.

  He is.

  Do you speak English?

  I say to the beautiful man.

  A little, the beautiful man says to me.

  You are beautiful, I say,

  No two ways about it.

  He says beautifully, Merci.

  Postcard to the Lace Man—The Old Market, Antibes

  To tell the truth,

  I can’t remember your name.

  It’s those Catalán eyes

  I can’t let go of.

  That and the memory

  of an inky tea

  sweetened with orange water,

  the sticky perfume

  of a cigarette

  from Persia,

  those photos of Tangiers.

  I forgot to tell you.

  I have a great respect

  for wives.

  Especially yours.

  Au revoir, mon ami.

  C’est la vie.

  That afternoon

  at the Musée Picasso—

  a pretty memory and enough

  for me.

  Letter to Jahn Franco—Venice

  You were full of stories.

  Was that red jacket of yours really

  once Bob Marley’s?

  The man you live with actually

  your brother?

  Those three women from Valencia

  all your lovers?

  It doesn’t matter.

  Venice was a good adventure.

  Dancing through canals.

  Ducking bridges from a motorboat

  that sped delirious at 4 a.m.

  under a laughing moon.

  So I let you down.

  Didn’t give in and fall

  under the spell of a bona fide

  Venetian artist on the street,

  replete with easel. A modern

  Casanova—wow.

  I remember that pathetic last ciao

  you gave me at the railway station—

  you said you felt as if

  you’d bought an ice-cream cone

  and it had fallen to the ground

  before you had a chance to taste it.

  Bought.

  Always that metaphor somehow or other.

  And what was I

  except an item not for sale.

  Well.

  After all, a man invests his time,

  his money even,

  though this was fifty-fifty.

  I owed nothing.

  Tell me,

  one artist to another,

  what does a woman owe a man,

  and isn’t freedom what you believe in?

  Even the freedom to say no?

  At least you did the night before

  when we clinked our glasses to the Muses

  and our common god.

  I don’t know.

  For all that talk of liberation

  I still felt that seam of anger

  when I danced with you

  and sometimes not with you at all.

  What if I hadn
’t gone home alone?

  Say my eye had gotten tangled with another’s.

  Or maybe yours.

  It might’ve happened that way.

  You never know.

  But to tell the truth

  I think true nature rises

  when the body dances.

  Perhaps that’s why I never

  have one partner,

  prefer to dance alone.

  No, I won’t

  come to Sardinia with you.

  Or even Spain.

  The truth is that uncomfortable next morning

  we had nothing to say to one another.

  Hardly a word until we reached the station.

  An ice-cream cone.

  In case you change your mind, you said.

  I know you won’t, but just in case,

  I’ll wait in Venice seven days.

  You were right about one thing—

  I didn’t come back.

  To Cesare, Goodbye

  Cesare,

  with those Medici eyes

  you could go far

  I said.

  But you’ve never

  been away from Tuscany

  except for a cousin’s wedding

  in Milano.

  I said come with me to Spain.

  Spain you said and laughed.

  Too far away—

  even Rome is too expensive.

  You were waiting for

  that job at the post office,

  a letter from an uncle

  that might help.

  Maybe one day

  I will see you in America

  I said.

  Maybe

  you said.

  And laughed.

  Ass

  for David

  My Michelangelo!

  What Bernini could compare?

  Could the Borghese estate compete?

  Could the Medici’s famed aesthete

  produce as excellent and sweet

  as this famous derriere.

  Did I say derriere?

  Derriere too dainty.

  Buttocks much too bawdy.

  Cheeks so childishly petite.

  Buns, impudently funny.

  Rear end smacking of collision.

  Ah, misnomered beauty.

  Long-suffering

  butt of jokes,

  object of derision.

  Pomegranate and apple

  hath not such tempting

  allure to me

  as your hypnotic

  anatomy.

  Then

  am I victim

  of your spell,

  bound since mine eyes

  did first espy

  that paradise of symmetry.

  And like Pygmalion transfixed,

  who sincere believed

  desire could unfix

  that alabaster chastity,

  grieved the enchantment

  of those small cruel hips—

  those hard twin bones—

  that house such enormous

  happiness.

  Trieste—Ciao to Italy

  for Natale Mancari

  Maybe we should’ve fallen in love.

  Or pretended to be.

  What was there to lose

  except a few hours of sleep.

  You needed me.

  But that wasn’t reason enough.

  And love is no charity,

  no tin cup and yellow pencils.

  What did we expect?

  Trieste was full of disappointments—

  a town that got lucky and had the sea.

  And how could I explain in raggedy Italian

  I still liked you.

  Maybe when your train gets into Milano

  and mine to Dubrovnik, we’ll perhaps regret

  what didn’t happen. Maybe.

  But any town with a name

  this sad deserves nothing

  but a stony memory.

  Peaches—Six in a Tin Bowl, Sarajevo

  If peaches had arms

  surely they would hold one another

  in their peach sleep.

  And if peaches had feet

  it is sure they would

  nudge one another

  with their soft peachy feet.

  And if peaches could

  they would sleep

  with their dimpled head

  on the other’s

  each to each.

  Like you and me.

  And sleep and sleep.

  Hydra Night—House on Fire

  When houses burn here

  you just watch.

  There is nothing

  but the sea

  for irony.

  Cinders wild as flies.

  Rooster crowing day too early.

  Night illumined. Moonless sky.

  I worked with others

  dragging furniture outdoors—

  books, tables, lamps—

  to save what could be saved.

  Water drizzled from a skinny hose.

  Buckets passed from

  hand to hand to hand.

  Somebody cursed in Greek.

  A neighbor gave me her sweater,

  asked if I was cold.

  First the grape arbor came down.

  And then the windows spoke.

  We watched until the roof

  sighed twice, then died.

  Then one by one went home

  to dream of fire.

  Hydra Coming Down in Rain

  I’m not certain

  but I imagine even

  mountains melt.

  In Hydra

  they come down

  in rain

  and down

  on cobbled

  steps

  inside your shoes

  unless your boots

  are rubber

  red.

  Bleed

  from lemon trees,

  whitewashed walls,

  wooden shutters,

  gravel,

  bougainvillea,

  clay tile roof,

  pomegranate,

  copper gutter,

  slippery flagstones,

  fresh donkey shit,

  and jasmine flowers.

  Down and down

  until the mountain

  meets the port

  and spills

  into

  the sea.

  Fishing Calamari by Moon

  for A. Stavrou

  At the bullfights as a child

  I always cheered for the bull,

  that underdog of underdogs,

  destined to lose, and I tell you

  this, Andoni, so you’ll understand,

  though we are miles from bullrings.

  The Greek moon a lovely thing

  to look at above our boat.

  We are an international crew tonight.

  Greek sea, African Queen, you, me.

  But I am sad. Probably the only

  foolish fisherman to cry

  because we’ve caught a calamari.

  You didn’t tell me how

  their skins turn black

  as sorrow. How they suck the air

  in dying, a single terrifying cry

  terrible as tin.

  You will cook it in oil.

  You will slice it and serve it

  for our lunch tomorrow.

  Endaxi—okay.

  But tonight my heart

  goes out to the survivors,

  to the ones who get away.

  To all underdogs everywhere,

  bravo, Andoni. Olé.

  Moon in Hydra

  Women fled.

  Tired of the myth

  they had to live.

  They no longer wait

  for their Theseus

  to rescue, then

  abandon them.

  Instead,

  they take

  the first boat out

  to Athens.

 
Live alone.

  No longer Hydra women

  bound to stone.

  Smoke rises

  from the Athens shore,

  and some say

  it’s the fumes of autos,

  motor scooters,

  factory pollution.

  But I think

  it’s an ancient rage.

  Women who grew tired

  beneath the weight of years

  that would not buckle,

  break nor bend.

  One Last Poem for Richard

  December 24th and we’re through again.

  This time for good I know because I didn’t

  throw you out—and anyway we waved.

  No shoes. No angry doors.

  We folded clothes and went

  our separate ways.

  You left behind that flannel shirt

  of yours I liked but remembered to take

  your toothbrush. Where are you tonight?

  Richard, it’s Christmas Eve again

  and old ghosts come back home.

  I’m sitting by the Christmas tree

  wondering where did we go wrong.

  Okay, we didn’t work, and all

  memories to tell the truth aren’t good.

  But sometimes there were good times.

  Love was good. I loved your crooked sleep

  beside me and never dreamed afraid.

  There should be stars for great wars

  like ours. There ought to be awards

  and plenty of champagne for the survivors.

  After all the years of degradations,

  the several holidays of failure,