"My Father's Poem"

My Father's Poem



I couldn't write about your ceremony,
the raw ritual when we laid your laugh
to rest. Only that I felt you
leave, saw a sagging, a shallow hollowing
of the Spirit self on that fifth
and final day when your 5-pointed
star of being left, and left
a husk of mariposa for our
rememberance of your vital body,
La Fuerza that was you. Fuerte.

...........................................My father
was fuerte, strong, and not afraid
of la Muerte who he met
and courted for 175 nights
under fire in a foreign land. "The enemy
is not the self." My father taught.
Why do what the body can
but the inner call resists?
A love that weakens you
is not love we should be renewing.
Now's the time,
my father would say con un abrazo fuerte.
"Art is time." And time is art
to create and share.
...........................I know I cannot write
this poem. But, "There's no such word
as can't," my grandmother would say
and he once called her "a saint,"
and who else could say that
about their ex-mother-in-law?

But you. But, you. But you
fashioned a scroll of your heart,
leapt to the light, and shone
an inner sun, that inner strength
you passed to me.
........................I write
and take another dance on the Spiral
of Life you left. Sacred. A legacy,
a father; an inheritance
of heart, a gene pool not confined
to the flesh, or family.
...............................You grew —
a heart, a home, a neighborhood,
a Nation — who doesn't know it yet;
who lives in a laugh and wears a crown
more precious than the gold
that raked your raza? Golden One, Ahau
en Tzolkin, Yellow Sun in the Mayan calendar,
a legacy of unexpiring flame,
unextinguishable light. Our art,
ancient seeds in the bone jar
of home; our dirt, this flesh,
these hands now, an ancient
garden coming to life — an ancient
tree coming to fruit in our lives.
May we practice the art
of the hug, the love. May we
write off the sadness. And,
gladden.
................Now
.........................is
..............................the time.
Time is Art. Art is Time.
It's time.
...............Now.
........................You,
.................................art.




6/12/05
c 2005 Lorna Dee Cervantes