___
breaking away to the u.s.
by José B. González
finally,
a day so perfect that
this morning’s awakening bombs
are overtaken by a woman’s wind chimes
of “tamales, tamales.”
on the way to the airport
iguanas hang upside down,
even they smile.
along farms and fields
rotten bullet seeds
are overtaken by flowering weeds.
on the side of the highway
a tall Maquilishuat tree gives
birth to premature pink petals
&
inside a plane headed north,
yani & i fly so high
that we can’t tell
cornfields from fences;
it’s such a perfect
final day.
© 2015, from Toys Made of Rock (Bilingual Press/Editorial Bilingüe, 2015).
__About the poet: Jose B. Gonzalez was born in San Salvador, El Salvador and immigrated to New London, Connecticut at the age of eight. He is the author of Toys Made of Rock (2015), based on his journey from a non-English speaker to a professor of English, and the collection When Love Was Reels (2017), which pays homage to Latino and Latin American film stars and icons. His poetry has been anthologized in the Norton Introduction to Literature, Theatre Under My Skin: Contemporary Salvadoran Poetry (2014), and The Wandering Song: Central American Writing in the U.S. He is the coeditor (with John S. Christie) of Latino Boom: An Anthology of U.S. Latino Literature (2006). A nationally known speaker, Gonzalez has presented at various colleges such as the University of Florida, Harvard University, and Cornell University; in countries including Mexico, Spain, and El Salvador; and institutions including the National Smithsonian Museum of African Art and the National Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian. He has been a contributor to National Public Radio and has published poetry in journals such as Quercus Review, Callaloo, The Teacher's Voice, Palabra, Acentos Review, and Colere. Gonzalez has been featured on Univision and the nationally syndicated show American Latino TV. For more, go to: http://www.josebgonzalez.com.
No comments:
Post a Comment