Warm Winters, Warmer Winter Waters
Inmaculada Lara-Bonilla
Last century’s hissing
hovers over the muddy mix,
resting back on the tracks
just outside my ashy window.
All along
the rusty silver beetle
rattles
slumber piles,
a line by the shore
off the murky riverito.
Inside the train,
the Hudson is
a family of five.
Mother, daughter
in sacred secrecy.
Curtains, lamps.
father and daughter
wrapped in the glowing
glove
of music.
Blurry silhouettes
stolen for the shadows
draw us
in the window mirror
as we tune into
the fervently recited
psalm
you taught us.
The neverending
licking train,
a thick murmur,
as the nine-year old
daughter glances
across the aisle,
looking twenty-five.
And the thick river runs
And our lashes grow
So long they bathe
in the water,
warmed up by
the snarl,
by the fervor,
by the memory of holding
on,
fingers sliding
through the back
of your hand,
while standing tiny
between your shoulders.
I, a tributary
of your legs,
a fleshy pennant
waiting for the line
of grownup secrets
to end.
Eyes in the Hudson,
water in mind,
the grey
blinding surface
not reflecting
the depth of my eyes,
the muted waters
the moistened silence
the river bed,
but our distance.
This american river
doesn’t know
how I knew
your clouds,
your pieces of cotton,
your breasts
the electric fingers buried
in my hair,
my mouth watered
my cheeks softened
to no end.
This river of irons,
unused to the sound
of the wood and
of the kitchen tools,
will not say how
I listened to your evening lessons,
nor confess how I bellowed
through our peepholes
through the waves and the wall
paper
through the light and dark
of bedtime,
through a river
of nightly bears.
Nor how,
in reverie,
I spied your dress,
your everyday feet,
my startled eyes locked,
my fantasies mounting,
your round, soft hand
wrapped around mine once
more
by the pool
by the moon
by the river
by the traffic light.
Posted: August 25, 2014 at 7:03 pm
