Camposantos
all we have is our hands and a hole in god’s earth
-federico garcia lorca
now
there is no one left to swaddle the acequias
if brown arms could reach out of this earth
they would
women in raven mantillas gather at noon
near the cusp of a chapel of heat-dried brick
above them the sun is a bowl
of mid-summer plums, blood-cerise turning
to purple, plucked from the sangre de cristos
amidst coyote fences and cast-iron railings,
locked cerquitas, wired once in old wicker,
each wife-mother caresses a marker wood
stakes born in stream bottom or splash-stone,
lip-reads words as murió el dia or memoria
kisses her crown of thorns, a rose, a heart
star, dove pray for them madrecita maria
we come to honor what has been
yet cannot be again
under day-star-of-noon, laden with wild lilies,
we plant our people’s proud history land sky
farm sisters of tecolote, mora, taos we bless
these holy fields basking in the pueblos’ thrall
among these gardens of the dead luminescent
graves reflect lightning-on-silver slivers of God.
(Manzanita Quarterly, Winter, 2002)
