OLIVER DE LA PAZ


AMADOR THE DAY AFTER THE DEATH OF HIS RHODE ISLAND RED /
KYRIELLE / PORTRAIT OF ST. BERNADETTE AS A SURREALIST LAND

Amador the Day After the Death of His Rhode Island Red

Reaches into his pocket,
Finds a bright primary made into a pen, sits
By the light of an oil wick and writes a note:
This bird was a fine bird.
The long hand scars ache
Where its beak-jabs once broke
His palm for grain.
Grip on the quill weakening,
He remembers claws
That once held throats of other roosters.
Like Amador, it was getting old,
its neck a tired rubber-band.
The once proud beak
Now swallows grasses.
Amador’s mouth
In the same way, points ground-ward,
As if on his back he were carrying
A sack heavy with years.
When red combs, once straight like a man’s back
Fold, balling into a fist, it is a sign.
It was leaving, in forgetfulness,
Feathers, as if a guide was needed
From the coop to the feed.
Dawn now without the call of dawn
Blooms through moss-like silence.
Amador can’t rest his head on down,
Hearing the rustle, a red dress worn on Sunday.
Now, Amador walks watching
The ground, drags his sandals like rakes,
And leaves furrows through handfuls of seed
The way a boat’s wake trails like a cassock
Where once, he remembers,
A bird’s feet left a path of asterisks.

[reverse]

Kyrielle

My sister died and her hair turned amber.
Her leg bones, the white calcium
shafts, in the freezer, her lumbar
in shoeboxes, bad museums.
There’s so much I want to believe;
perch her bright skull on a column
and wonder why her bones outlive
the shoeboxes, bad museums.

[reverse]

Portrait of St. Bernadette as a Surrealist Landscape


Again I dream her face is my backyard,
the weight of her mouth cracks leaves. The blades
of grass, thin villus above her lips, won’t grow
because of days without water. The bough
of the dark plum tree, a limb threaded
above the earth, is an eyebrow. She’s heard
the call from the grotto and grows afraid.
I watch her eyes open, blooming mallows.
Again I dream
of her bright features, her nose, an old
rose. The flowers are falling in my orchard,
flesh of her face in ecstasy. Her hours
are spent searching for a fountain. She’ll howl
when the apparition comes, its face bared
again. I dream.

[reverse]