Waiting, and: Fragments: or How is Life in Chile?

69sagaris Lake Sagaris Waiting I read 'til the words were endless ciphers dead leaves in a snowbound field stones thru the green glass water of a pond Silent, distant, still. I brushed my teeth, my hair, scrubbed my face as if the rough cloth could wipe the tension from my mouth the questions from the blue eyes trapped like birds in the mirror. In the kitchen I stared thru the window as if my being there, my eyes searching every passerby for your beard, your walk, your smile, could bring you home. I went to the living room washed the windows clean of dirt the tear streaked dirt of a child's face — street child feet frozen to the asphalt, hand out for coins mouth open for bread. If waiting along could bring you home, how many weeping women would be crying with joy? How many men's stone eyes would turn to tears? For you, the pictures under glass the absence present in so many homes. For you, we search the headlines for blood, the hungry for brothers and sisters, ourselves for the courage to continue to fill this empty cup of waiting with the warm wine which will welcome you home, every one of you. You belong to all of us now. We belong to each other. July 1980 70 the minnesota review Lake Sagaris Fragments: or How is Life in Chile? 1 . Children play as adults dream moving from one toy to the next — the ball rolls into the bedroom on the bed a story that must be read, then you look at the wall, follow it to the floor a truck carries you away to the far north, a country you've never seen, if paradise were visited by a glacier and the trees froze, there you would find my Canada. 2.The Oxford Anthology of Canadian Literature and La Antología de Literatura Latinoamericana rub noses beside the bed. In the bathroom we jostle elbows and compete for a space at the sink, laughing in two languages which mingle like music. 3.Sometimes I tire of all those images. How many twisted metaphors can you untangle from a bullet paving the air with death? How many times can you bear to turn a page and find a corpse naked and bleeding between the lines? Why are the flowers withering on graves sobbing in grass silent witnesses of a protest that does not end? When will I open my eyes and find this eternal summer of molten dust 71 sagaris charcoal anger, gunpowder wind and human flesh sizzling on electric beaches is not the death of hope? How can I touch the black hairs flowing across your belly and think only of swimming through their depths and tasting honey? This is not the country where the blenders are made nor love, washing machines, hope they're all imported. The foreign debtload is enormous. Like alcoholics we have cried maudlin tears to the bartenders who raise interest rates like snakes charmed by foreign flutes. Who's dancing to the piper now? We're listening to rock V roll and disco. Outside the world brakes suddenly and stops. We fly through the windshield snatch greedily at diamonds in the air and terminate in blood and broken glass. But where's the driver who drove us to our deaths? He's having a face transplant so he can return to the screen — Latin America — a faded actor's dream. In this country there's no need to commit suicide death drives the cars waits at the doors of the houses and love hides itself in your eyes watching me with tenderness and fear. March 1982 ...