Enchanted Air: List 3

When it arrives, a small photo
of a chestnut colt
is enclosed inside a folded sheet
of airmail paper
so delicate
that it resembles
a sliver
of moonlight.

Mythical. Prophetic.
An oracle colt who foresees
my future as a trainer,
adventurer,
explorer—
maybe even a winged
centaur.

An oracle colt who foresees
my future as a trainer,
adventurer,
explorer—
maybe even a winged
centaur.

Something about Cuba seizing ownership
of oil refineries.

Dad wants an art studio, and Mom
longs for a bigger garden,
so they’ve borrowed money
to buy a strange house
on a steep hill,
a precarious home
that feels dangerous,
as if it could slide
down this slope
during the next
earthquake.

Hardly anyone speaks to me,
until one day
on the way home,
I find a tiny calico cat
stranded beneath
the wooden stairway.

Just the shock and fear are enough
to make old people die of heart attacks,
while young ones have to endure
a vigil, this torment,
the slow wait
to start breathing
poisoned air.

Listen for a piercing shriek,
the whistle that will warn us
as poisonous A-bombs
zoom close.

Pretend that furniture is enough
to protect us against perilous flames.

When I hide under my frail school desk,
my heart grows as rough and brittle
as the slab of wood
that fails to protect me
from reality’s
gloom.

When I hide under my frail school desk,
my heart grows as rough and brittle
as the slab of wood
that fails to protect me
from reality’s
gloom.

During visits to Dad’s relatives,
long, complicated arguments
about Communism.
Capitalism.

Powerful messages must be
passing back and forth
between the American president
and the Soviet premier.

Diplomacy succeeds. Words win.

Nations were not destroyed.
Cities were not devastated.

Newsmen spoke of the Cold War,
an almost-war of words,
not a battle of bombs
and blood.

Without any diplomatic relations
between the United States and Cuba,
there is no embassy or consulate.

Without any diplomatic relations
between the United States and Cuba,
there is no embassy or consulate.

When an Alabama church is bombed
by racist extremists, four girls are killed,
civil rights workers are murdered,
people all over the country
march to demand equal rights.

She could change her country.
Take a naturalization test.
Answer all the questions.
Swear allegiance to the United States.
Become a citizen.

Abuelita writes letters in code,
inventing poetic metaphors,
to prevent the island’s censors
from understanding her words.

With new words like “hippie”
suddenly replacing “beatnik”
and “bohemian,” Dad reclaims
the wanderlust
of his youth.

With new words like “hippie”
suddenly replacing “beatnik”
and “bohemian,” Dad reclaims
the wanderlust
of his youth.

But at school, we don’t study
our own nation’s trade embargo
against the island.

I no longer feel sullen and sad.

In Spain, we venture underground,
into the mystery of prehistoric art.

All over Spain, strangers speak to us
in Spanish, then whisper to one another
in forbidden dialects—Basque, Catalán,
and Gallego, all the banned tongues
of local provinces.

By now, I am old enough to understand
that the island’s revolution merely replaced
one tyranny with another.

When nomadic gitano/Gypsy caravans
pass across the land in horse-drawn wagons,
I feel like every creature on earth
just might be mysteriously linked,
as we wander from one place
to another, constantly learning
about one another’s ways.

It’s a sight I plan to remember,
this spontaneous unity
when faced
with disaster.