Vincent Toro
A circular path is carved through your front yard.
Pink sinkholes gather in your medicine
cabinet. You exalt busted blenders like sophisms
scrawled by retired scholars.
Your life has become a shy puzzle,
a canyon of foreclosures,
an abandoned fish market.
The world has accused you of not being a world,
of loving meaningless songs,
and you have responded by raising your children to unravel
spools of red tape across cities of wax.
The promise of a guilt-free purchase
congeals like gum
beneath a wooden school desk.
.
The world has accused you of not being a world.
You retort with an acceptance speech
scripted by beautiful gangsters. You live under
the thumb of contracts hoisted
like minarets. Landslides court you
with a hospice of deserted
checkout counters and comic strip altars.
.
Your young lungs constrict in the presence of cedar and ash.
The world has accused you of not being
a world and you respond by offering your guests
sliced cheese and snow globes.
You prod them about their holiday plans.
Your path is littered
with toll booths and subpoenas.
.
You dig shallow trenches around the kitchen table.
Sub-contractors install a wall of plaster
teeth in your bathtub. The sea has divorced you
and taken the dog. The world
has accused you of not being a world,
of unhearing the voices
that hold together the seams
.
of your jacket, and you have responded
with despondent sighs, the kind of sigh
that makes orphans of widows.
Soon enough you will inherit
the pollen of a thousand uprooted gardenias
as you wait for the sunlight
to learn your nickname.
.
*
.
Sorta Rican Book of Dreams (Free Sample version)
Computer
-With human hands that poke you when you try to type means you will forgive yourself
for a mistake you never had the sense to make.
-Singing to you like Hector Lavoe means that your oldest daughter will grow up to become
the Director of Shrubbery at a bankrupt amusement park.
Ladybug
-Crawling on the hood of your car means you will inherit a vast collection of incomplete maps.
-Swimming in a bowl of soup means you will forget your wife’s birthday after you forget
that you never married.
Mango
-Eating one while a chimpanzee folds your laundry means the IRS will mistakenly pronounce you dead and offer your mother a tax refund they’ll later ask her to return.
-One with feet that chases you through a botanica means that your wardrobe is outdated.
Pie
-Gigantic blueberry pies that disappear and reappear at random means that a building will be renovated on the south side of your block.
-A pear pie left out in the middle of a superhighway means a dead relative wants back the bottle of Presidente they gave you last Christmas.
Quicksand
-Sinking in quicksand that smells like burnt cauliflower means that on your wedding night the photographer will forget to remove his lens cap while capturing the kiss.
Rooms
-Painted to resemble a city beach means that you will get a big promotion for a job that doesn’t pay you.
-With the furniture on the ceiling means that you will receive an honorary degree for your research on the sleeping patterns of superstar DJ’s.
-A classroom the size of a football field (known by gringos as a soccer field) where the school janitor makes fun of you means that you will win an all expenses paid vacation to Tucumcari, New Mexico.
Squirrel
-A squirrel carrying a balloon with the face of Emma Goldman on it means that a calamity of bow ties will be left in your glove box the evening after next.
Water
-A glass of water means you want to quit your job to become a licensed figment of the imagination.
-A muddy pond means you want to quit your job to become a licensed figment of the imagination.
-An ocean means you want to quit your job to become a licensed figment of the imagination.
-A plastic pool means you want to quit your job to become a licensed figment of the imagination.
-A single teardrop means you want to quit your job to become a licensed figment of the imagination.
.
*
.
Fibonacci ekphrastic for “The Birth of a City” by Angel Rodriguez-Diaz
*
.
panting. sighing. an ankle angled over a thigh. you blush. a rush. lips spread like wings of a pigeon. skin harvested. fields plowed. a partly cloudy afternoon. a disrobing. an uneasy feeling. an unexpected heat. sweat beads like prayer beads. an imperfect curvature. a voluptuous wall. a matchstick’s red head rubbed on flint. an intent gaze. unattached. a nose entrenched in a chin. lotion applied to a calf. a calf slaughtered for the feast. a secret drawn in a fleshy fold. a promise unattached. a wrist rotated counterclockwise. a quivering. a trinket falls to the fall. two bells conjugated like a verb. your mercurial poise. a feline pose. lock and key joined. an unhinged door opened twice. oasis. water lapped by a dog’s tongue. silent rhythm. a heartbeat out of synch. an eyelash sculpture like a lone peacock. four legs woven into a wicker basket. sliding. ungraceful pirouettes. buttons sewn onto a turquoise vest. clipped nails and clipped beaks. concurrent currents of parallel streams. a distant pulse. subliminal sucking. breathe from a laugh, resurrected. your cheeks, pillows. a sliding door. a cracked inkwell. a cupped hand mistaken for as a safety net. a fumbling. a rescinding.
a whisper.
a squeeze.
a trembling.
a treble clef. a cleft heart, unattached. a broken circle. a mountain interrupted by
a valley. attached. unattached. attached. unattached. an attaché case stuff with ripe plums. a scent ascending. a symphonic moaning. a phone disconnected. a flexion. affliction. a tension. extension. torque and sweet thunder. a clenched fist. a bit lip. candle wax on a dead victrola. a flood. a flushing. a draught. an opening. a closing unrelated. cracked eggs on a kitchen floor. a well-timed seizure. a departure. the singed cuff of a smoking jacket. two car radios playing the same station. a refraction. an unfurling. an unmasking. a question left unasked. a contraction. a contradiction. an unveiling. a cleansing. a becoming. a breath, unattached. a death, unattached. a thumbprint on a pelvis. a promise, unattached. a bosom, unattached. a diamond heist hatched. a grape plucked. an orange, peeled. a puddle in the driveway. a pillow wrung. unattached. a fugue hummed. a trail of pink silt. unattached. a torpor. a pelt. a moth and a bruised flask. a singing matroshka. a riddle planted in a blue belly. a summons. a bewilderness. a plate of dried figs. a lost earring. an ebbing. an echo. a tremor.
An oil painting
In the den
Waiting to be hung.
* *
Image: Constanza Alberione, “Chano” (2009), courtesy of miau miau
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