"Utopia" and Other Poems

Utopia

When it was over, a gardener
described the colony's demise.
It was all about kerosene.
Some of the settlers longed to stay up all night
reading. Others preferred sleep.
Lamps, the more practical members of the community argued
should be used sparingly, to conserve fuel.

Unable to reach an accord
people began drifting away from their homes
one by one. Some left burdened with towering armloads
of books that were soaked and ruined by the first heavy downpour.
Others carried only fragile glass lanterns and a precious supply
of gleaming oil hoarded in rusty metal cans
that leaked onto the soil so slowly
only the gardener
noticed.

---

Pursuing Peace

Abigail rushed into the wilderness
on a donkey, not a warhorse.

She hurried with gifts of bread, wine, mutton
roasted grain, raisins and cakes of figs
---all of this while her wealthy husband Nabal
was so busy overseeing the shearing
of his thousands of sheep
that he shunned the wandering men of David
as foreigners
refusing to feed them
or offer them water
simply because they were outsiders
unknown.

David thanked Abigail the peacemaker
not for the food and wine
but for keeping him from bloodshed
---no need to avenge himself
once he had been welcomed as a countryman
the concept of borders
unknown.

---

Labyrinth
Cholula, Mexico

In catacombs
beneath the high plateau
of layered temples
and cathedrals

I followed a blind guide
along sinewy tunnels
touching the wavering forms
of candlelit frescoes

only one thing seemed certain
the sightless guide knew his way

the candle he held
was a beacon for me.

---

Palette

In the Dark Ages, blue and yellow seemed so far apart in the spectrum that their union was outlawed. Artists, dyers, apothecaries and weavers were accused of alchemical crimes, the creation of green a strange magic. Even cooks and midwives were careful when they stirred herbs and roots. Imagine the rainbow with one color excised, great forests stripped of moss and mint, the rocky land devois of emerald, jade and malachite.

Imagine the exultance of lapis, indigo, azurite and woad, the only legal shades of blue in a world reduced to primary colors.

Much later, the blues became music. Blue shadows, stars, flames, ocean waves, choir robes, a single blue feather falling inside an empty cage, sunlight streaming into a blue glass vase on a windowsill, absorbing the memory of flowers.

Twilight. Tincture. A blue devil of loss sailing back and forth between broken hearts.

---

Fractions

The mathematics of the Cuban Missile Crisis were complex
in Los Angeles, October, 1961, hiding under my desk
at Washington Irving Junior High School
where the teacher had just assured us
that soon a nuclear bomb would fall, and the blinding white light
would be followed by an impressive blast
then the mushroom cloud would rise and spread
gracefully, like a time-lapse film of a flowerbud

opening

This much was promised, the wooden desks would protect us
from missiles sent by Russia and Cuba, dual enemies

my nature

I imagined that as long as I never answered when people asked
that complex mathematical question, 'What are you?'
they would not see the fractions
half Russian-American, half Cuban, my father, my mother
two equal, measured slices on a carefully divided pie chart
archaic wall of maps at the Pentagon, ancient formula

mysterious

---

Translucence

The quest for rare books
in a church library
led me to stained glass windows
depicting snowy mountain peaks
and green valleys.

Bundled against the cold
I must have looked homeless
because a food basket
was offered by a church secretary
in a voice filled with compassion.

For an instant I was tempted
to accept the strange mirror image
and venture back out onto the streets
in search of the hunger that feeds humility
but I was there to view rare books
so I asked my way to the library
where all the illustrations resembled
stained glass landscapes
of jagged rock
and restful pasture.

---

Caravan

Asleep on the bus in a distant land
you awaken surrounded by mountains
and horsemen.
You reach for a scrap of unleavened bread
left behind by a generous
goatherd.

The man beside you is holding a clay pot
overflowing with freshly churned butter.
He dips his finger into the gold
and spreads its veil of clarity
across your bread
a gift
like sky
the horizon.

You have no foreign words
no way to tell him
that this has been
the most welcoming meal
of your life
an exploration
like swift storm clouds lifting
away
from the dangerous
landscape.