Reyes Cardenas
FATHER AND DAUGHTER
You and your father
at the creek

my mind puts a fork
in the moment

time flies on anyway
its one wing metallic blue

a crane picks at floating trash
and shakes its head

the creek ambles and staggers
under your dress

I think you were
eleven then

the sky went all the way up
until it disappeared

Reyes Cardenas
HIS TOY BURNT
God was playing with his toys
when he accidently grabbed Chamaco,
broke one of Chamaco’s wheels,
bent Chamaco’s nose of spring and summer.
Chamaco didn’t hold a grudge,
the power of playfulness suffice,
come through,
stood still, fell over,
but otherwise
nothing became of otherwise.
And God’s incandescence
flamed out in the sky so bright.
Chamaco’s soul of holy rocks
heavy in his old age hung on,
brown scar of having been mishandled by God
only a scar upon the sweet horizon.

Reyes Cardenas
FOURTH STREET FLASHBACK
My aunt forces me to play Mexican bingo
in my underwear

my little nuts cold against the wooden floor
embarrassed by La Dama

El borrachito makes fun of me
the mermaid's top distracts me

as I put a pinto bean
on Las Jaras

when I complain that
I don't want to play anymore

my aunt beats me
with a wire coathanger

I run up and down the gravel street
oh the joys of growing up

REYES CARDENAS was born in Seguin, Texas in 1948. His books include Tortured Barrio Songs published by FlowerSong Press in 2019.

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