THE SMELL OF COLA
A certain Latin rhythm snakes
through the open window,
a warmed-over breeze.
The taste of soda slides
over my tongue with a fizzy
pique of sweat.
And I'm right back there,
a dozen years ago,
a thousand miles south,
smelling the stench
of bureaucrats filed under
their desks.
Through concrete dust and heat-
shimmer of the high plateau
another tickle, tremble, tremor
hits the drunk-dry lake-bed,
piles apartments
floor over ceiling, curtained
windows smashed
above Coca signs, so many
hands reaching.
A thousand miles north
I look out my unbroken
window over palms. But
I'm seeing
offices and factories fall apart
around their
Coke machines.
SETTLER
You moved in down the road with a husband
and a fat yellow dog. Then a young bitch,
lean and brindled, arrived and the husband
left with his motorcycle but not the dogs.
Half-tame cats go skirting the edges, multi-
colored streaks of tails. A handyman's truck
parked in your driveway more often
than anything could be broke. Followed
by a pinto colt in need of breaking,
and yet another dog, a speckled lass
with a glass-blue eye, and a nanny goat.
The nanny bleats her seasons, the fat
old hound-dog lies in the sun, the young
pups go chasing cars, the cats skittle
from windowsill to tree, the yearling colt
kicks fences, the sides of the barn,
the morning air. And now a full-grown hog,
sausage-red and bristled, snuffles around
like he owns the place. We don't
even wonder if you'll eat or keep him.
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