He’s
all talk
all muscle
shallow
deep
in the know
in the dark
for real
unreal
my friend
your friend
Well I wouldn’t call him a friend friend.
He owes me
I owe him
Haven’t seen him since high school
Saw him two hours ago
I’ve never seen him with a woman
I’ve never seen him without a woman
Trust me, he’ll show
He’ll never show now
He’ll know that we’ve been talking about him.
On that, gentlemen, we agree.
for T. Andrew Carter
Yellowed and chipped the teeth of Gomez,
slumped drowsy on a chair in a Veracruz cantina,
waiting
for his ship to leave port,
to descend again in coveralls
engine room steps,
ready with clipboard, rag, wrench and pliers
to check, adjust, repair or replace
each pipe, pump and filter
in an enclosed world
he understands.
Brown the eyes of Isabella
who climbed the hotel stairs with him.
Her body, a well, a breeze,
taking the dust from his tongue.
Other Isabellas
in Miami, Houston and New Orleans.
Earrings and stories—
a violent boyfriend, a backstreet abortion,
plans to go to night school.
Gomez listened —
their talk, full of undercurrents and debris.
What creatures scuttled and preyed
in that pressing darkness.
Fog. Typhoon. Iceberg. Hidden reef.
All manner of man, woman and child taken
seen again
from a deathbed
or in an orphan’s dreams.
Play the accordion, harmonica and guitar.
Drink bright whiskey and rum.
Search the sky and the bible again.
A Pedro Infante song on the cantina jukebox.
When it ends
Gomez looks down at the sweatband
of his Panama hat.
He’ll begin this new day
with a shave then a shoeshine,
see if there’s a letter
at the post office
from any Isabella.
Your journey will be long,
dangers certain.
From clouds snakes will fall.
These can be killed only
by those amongst you
who have eaten wolf.
Don’t drink from pond or stream
in which black reeds grow.
One mouthful will turn you to stone.
Sleep with an eagle feather
clasped in your fist.
This keeps away lightning.
Find my son,
carried off by Tartars.
He has a crescent-shaped scar
on his left cheek.
By this you will know him.
One hundred fine horses
for his safe return.
I’m too old to ride with you.
Be my eyes,
vigilant in every village and forest.
Put an end to my nightmares
in which two Tartars
whip my blindfolded son
towards the edge of a cliff.
(from Beneath Our Armour)
Ten pages a day in longhand,
Verna’s new novel is going well.
Verna sits on a park bench overlooking the Pearl River.
There beneath its surface—
fish, eels, crabs,
perhaps the revolver she dropped into it
two decades ago.
She watches—
a stray dog leave the shade of a tattered palm
to paw at a watermelon rind,
a couple dancing on an apartment terrace.
The tango music is loud,
the woman bends to the man’s lead,
his lips move closer to the lobe of her right ear.
They are kissing, not dancing.
The man is shirtless now.
Both fall to their knees,
roll away from view.
Verna returns
to her apartment,
to re-reading What We Talk About When We Talk About Love
by Raymond Carver,
stories about feelings expressed haltingly, violently or too late.
Verna looks at herself in the mirror, sees again—
that upper tooth chipped when she fell down the apartment stairs
on another blurred morning dedicated to drinking gin,
a woman who shot her cheating husband
in a Coloane apartment twenty years ago.
Two bullets in his lying face—
a mess for the maid to find
when she came for more than the cleaning
each Wednesday.
Verna
moves towards her bedroom,
gets into bed,
thinking about the new character
who will appear in the next chapter.
She’s decided his name
and whom he’ll kill first.
(from Beneath Our Armour)
Two Japanese soldiers tied me to the lamppost with rope.
Their commanding officer had a small mole on his right cheek.
He showed me the knife.
When he began I fainted.
Thirst. Dizziness. Buzzing flies.
My hand moved up to my right ear.
A hole. Congealed blood. I fainted again.
In the prison camp I begged a fellow prisoner to slash my throat.
“Not for a double ration of rice,” he said.
His name was Wang,
He and I became master rat-catchers,
cooked them on the blade of a shovel,
sucked each bone clean.
When the Japanese surrendered,
Wang returned to the mainland,
I remained in Hong Kong,
laboured unloading cargo
down on the waterfront.
Bought a gun off a seaman.
Many times I’ve stood in front of the hotel mirror,
the muzzle of the gun in my mouth.
Opium allows me
to briefly float free of my ribs.
I’ve written to my father,
told him I’ve met a kind woman,
been promoted to foreman.
The crafting of these lies
finds me opening the hotel drawer,
lifting out the gun again.
Last week,
I threw a brick through the window
of another Japanese restaurant.
I wait for the knock on the door.
I imagine the one handcuffing me,
a rookie,
the war, pages in a history book
he studied at high school.
In the cell,
I’ll look at
the walls,
the initials and dates
scratched there.
(from Beneath Our Armour)
trying to climb a ladder to heaven,
trying to juggle sacks of money and his heart,
the selves they cannot learn or flee,
the time between kisses growing longer,
the time between lies growing shorter.
from their children’s foreheads
with shreds of the Mexican flag,
others trying to catch every drop in soup bowls.
California, New York City, Mexico,
each sampled woman, grain and fruit,
king of gluttony, seated at table,
as a skeleton waiter whisks away
The river is brown-hued, wide.
In its shallows small black fish appear,
hyphens of life,
pleasing barefoot children.
The river is pelican-ushered to the sea.
The beach curves south to a crop of hills
where a white lighthouse stands,
its spiralling stairs now climbed
by camera-burdened tourists.
In the sky, there’s a small plane, silver-bellied,
gone when you turned
to a Ruth Rendell paperback.
This coastline asks you to name yourself,
fisherman, beachcomber, surfer, retiree,
to examine whether you’re more than that.
eases from rock to sky,
becomes a speck and miracle
to a small boy, a sandcastle lord,
standing sandy-kneed, squinting.
The wind, the waves, play their games of give and take,
the horizon searches its deep pockets
for the makings of tomorrow’s weather.
