Girls In A Pool

Girls in a pool
slice their wrists with honey

the beach ball
thigh bruise

overhead an airplane tows a banner
which proclaims the obvious sack

not enough of us
to go around

the cars are parked
like buckets after rain

come girls
dry yourselves off

before rocks
replace the neighborhood

El Viejito

what's this world
coming to

said the viejito
mexicans used to go

into the fields
to get their excercise

now they go
to the jeem

My Snow

I lie down with her
I am the color of my snow

I am limping
as we make love

it is all new to her
the stars are just a floor

she moans
like dry leaves

she cries
and her hands fall off

she is  besides herself
her thighs are nothing now

the hard knuckles of the moon
pop when it's over

What Really Happened At Roswell

A space ship farted
as it skipped along the ground.

Small aliens held their noses.
A skidmark on calzones.

The Army dudes rushed to the scene,
and confiscated everythene.

The space ship
had been eating beans.

The only fuel
faster than gasolines.

The Mexican-looking aliens
were whisked away---I think I read

that no tortillas were harmed,
only bread.

Runaway

My lover's run off

to North Africa.

She took her cash

and cheating heart.

She thinks 

Adam and Eve rode camels.

An oasis

can be carried on her back.

Or so she said

in her last moonlit email.

The same one

in which she called me "poor Edgar."

Prompting me

to take a shower

in my mother's car.

My lover knocks on the door

of the pyramids

until the sun-god answers.

He's so goddamn pale,

she tells her guide.

A camel 

never wants to shit.

It gathers

jewels in its hump.

Arab women hate my lover's ass

because they can see it.

The pyramids

sway to the west.

The old curator

was such a prick until last spring.

I don't think 

my lover will ever come back to back.

Her eyes

explode like hand grenades.

Cleopatra's bones

float down the Nile like plastic bottles.

Sad desert

swallows sand.

La Luisa

Barryo barryo
burning bright.

Little latin Lupe Lou,
the bullets and the beauty too.

I fought the law
on the lawyer's lawn.

Here I am
running and shooting.

Barryo barryo
naughty night.

The sirens
and the pretty lights.

It's either handcuffs
or culeros.

Barryo barryo
say goodnight.

Everything's
alright.

Rainy Day Lovers

Boy shots a rabbit in the head like Lorca
hind legs twitching

the space ship went cuckoo
as it sped along the ground

other lovers inconspicuously
make sand

wolf windows were wild
as I peered out nervously

my own lover Ignacia
lay prone upon the bed

her buttocks
spoke imperial language

outside
the world kept on dressing in jerseys

and the rain
lowered itself on a rope

Lothario

My chin on your  shoulder blade,
I'm a pile-driver.

A child with Jello
pauses in mid-sentence in the other room again.

My mind rockets into yesterday.
In the calm that overwhelms,

I am a bastard.
Paper pours out of your smile,

my bandits caress your jeans.
You whip out a teddy bear snake,

have the dog fixed,
the cat de-meowed,

our love-life will not bear fruit,
you scream at the top of your lungs,

while molecules
bounce above the shallow rings.

Rock En Rol

First time I saw a Mexican dance rock en rol,
I stood there with my mouth wide open.

I was handed my first pair of dancing shoes
when I turned ten.

The barrio had not been invented yet.
White snakes filled the land like dirt.

A brown girl's petticoat
floated in the air like boats.

Her partner yelled ajua
as he spun her top.

I was too young to understand.
I moved my hips awkwardly.

I threw my head back too carefully,
the first time I saw a Mexican dance rock en rol.

Walking The Dog

Mexicans don't walk their dogs
and if they do they're agringados.

The punks
throw rocks at a puppy

as if the act was beautiful.
A girl walks down the street,

she's being paid lip service to.
An odd time to think

that a strumpet
sinks into the Rio Bravo like bread.

I walk on stilts
without my dog.

It's either this
or synonyms.

Mexicans don't walk their dogs---
they're not that kind of race.

El Popo

In a taco shirt
the unruly dirty waters mount.

A sun-baked brick
addresses the crowd in frogsuit.

Two dead teenage girls
dance mild salsa.

Their panties
hidden up in the volcanic tubes.

I take the train
into the snow.

A peasant's chicken
recites Octavio Paz.

Part bird myself,
I'm overjoyed.

There's been no crime
committed in Mexico in decades,

says the police chief,
mimicking a brown snowball.

Mexican Sky

The Mexican sky
shook free of clouds,

like a dog
of fleas,

children of lice,
spring of ice,

the sun
of night,

the moon
of man.

Oh, Mexico,
what have you done!

De Colores

Dusted off my tamales
for a speech again:

This lost land
where white clouds

crash down upon our cherry heads
at every turn,

has its own soft selfish rocks to lay its head on,
its own lax view of oppression,

its own victims denied.
The law excludes them

with the same worn excuse.
Take heart,

friends.
The cornhusk

held by the muchacha
with the beautiful eyes reminds us that

la raza's
good at grasping at straws,

but better at making the land confess
its true colors