Maurice
Kenny
from “Zapata II”
Snow flowers the lawn here: daisies, crocus
. . .
enormous blossoms even though today is the first
day of the new spring, the last spring of the
century, amazing. If luck holds out I will have
survived into two centuries, and my father believed
me weak and that I would probably not last out
the growing pains of my late teen years. We
fooled everyone, didn’t we! Soon the yard will
be purpled in wild violets, heal-all,
hyacinth which will call every thief in the
neighborhood to pick whatever pleases their
fancy regardless to the known fact that
the effort is against the law and strips the yard
of spring beauty.
I sit here now and imagine
the snow flowers of Teotihuacán . . .
Popocatepétl speaks and its
sister volcano and those toward the north
and your southern summits glistening under
the rich sun with cones of snow teething the
morning airs of the plazitas where steaming
coffees wait hot and delicious in
tazitas near scalding to the early rising lip
and sweet bread, jacaranda leaning against an
adobe wall, scarlet petals reaching toward
that cold blue sky which helped birth your dreams,
your revolution, your Indian heart, the
essence of your tierra, the voice of freedom
and pan, sweet or no. . . .
Let us take a watermelon
from a vine; slice it in half; cut off two
pieces for us; let teeth tear into the red flesh;
have you painted this picture, Frida. Have you
freed the farmer to grow this melon, Emiliano,
Señor Zapata, warrior, revolutionist, hero,
icon, myth, ghost!
Yes, snows flower the lawns and dogwood trees.
Spring frumps its hairs on the opposite side
of my lake where silly mallards have hung about
the winter long, a few fins frozen into the ice
and left to die by night, mates calling out
to fly south the normal winter route out of cold
and death caused by a fistful of bread crumbs
or pizza crusts, illegal, but who cared when our
needs to be a St.Francis are met regardless
to life or death. The people always die . . . bird,
wolf or human and blood stains the hot hands of our
masters, those we have foolishly elected to watch
over our lives and liberties. No thanks. I’d
rather follow your ghost and your white steed
as you roam the night of the mountain guarding
the winds.
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