Two Poems
In Mid-Dig
I tear through landscapes,
split dirt with a shovel
like I’m severing heads
of stray garden snakes, full thrust
and all my body straight into the ground
and back out, growing the grave-
wide hole quick as an inmate in escape
of Hell. The thud of struck earth
echoes into the tick of a clock,
but dawn is still
delayed behind thick marine layer, heavy
mist over our heads, drenched street.
In mid-dig, I catch my dad looking
over my shoulder, judging
the dimensions of what I’m doing.
When his eyes aren’t on me, in this dim
haze I’m the one watching him—
his reflective face, forehead
glazed with sweat, skin decipherable
as pencil on tin, concrete
an embroidery of crust all over his shirt,
body constantly turning from work
to work project, shoulders rounding,
arched from this spin
with no stop, whorl of his vinyl mouth
never playing, only opened
into a half-grunt, silver fillings catching cloud-light,
voice as quiet as the melody of rain on glass,
a room-filling chill like a needle running endless
at the end of a record, wet sound of seconds
passing like waterflow.
I Would Sometimes Steal Out Of My Mother’s Womb
When She Was Sleeping
But it was dark, and I did not go far.
Blinded by frail blue light,
chaos reigned
in this oxygen-starved space.
Blinded by blue light,
I was forced to enter her dreams
and drift in this asphyxiated space,
drowning in tea brews of silt and vegetation.
I was forced to enter her dreams
to dine with devilfish
in tea brews of silt and rotten vegetation,
devoured by the sea as one fatal morsel.
I dined with devilfish
who told stories of a crumbling world treasure
devoured by the sea as one fatal morsel,
though I had asked for communion among the cold stones.
I heard stories of a crumbling world treasure
when chaos reigned.
What I needed was communion among the cold stones.
But it was dark, and I could not go far.
—Esteban Ismael, San Diego, CA
