Thunder Sandwich  #23

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Margarita Engle

GHOST TOWN

Once so deeply incised

the time-smoothed names

on marble headstones

now reach with miniature arms

of ruffled lichen's

illegible growth.

Tunnels and mine shafts

have been filled to hide darkness

from the children

of the living.

Blood has crumbled away

from thick adobe walls

in the one-room jail

where men were chained

to an iron ring

at the center

of the shadowy floor.

Twice each year

a traveling priest

still visits the old church

Easter

and the Day of the Dead

when a procession of residents

can be seen carrying candles and marigolds

to the oven-shaped graves

where a picnic of sugar-skulls

will be equally divided

cheerfully shared.

THE BEACHES OF CUBA

When the revolution was still wild and new

there were shark fences

and the toxic purple spines

of sea urchins throbbing in the sole

of my small-child's foot

there was segregation too

black and white beaches

on an island of brown skin

no one quite sure

where to swim.

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