Love on the Streets: Selected and New Poems

Cojo at the Millennium

• 127 cojo at the millennium His face in the moment I’m stopped in the aisle looking down on him, his face under the hat, first seat beyond First Class, plays like the light on Lake Atitlan, whimsical, always changing. From under the khaki brim his eyes meet mine. And again. A voice saying Love yourself as if you’re being fed to God. Once a hero, Army torturer or guerrilla, no matter. Half his body left as carrion on a battlefield. But his stature, without legs, just the trunk of him is so great I almost collapse to my knees, cry in his lap, marry me. A man who’s seen enough maybe you’re big enough to love me. In my seat way back his face as we lift into the Guatemalan weave of sky floats before me. The right hand holding the burntoff stump of the left, hurting. He wants to live, that’s why each breath is whimsical, almost a joke. Face I realize only now lightly burned, veiled like those thieves and killers in the movies who wear women’s nylons as masks, stretching the already stretched Indian face just enough to make him strangely more beautiful. Mystical. Like the too-taut facelift of a Hollywood star. At Customs, out of the corner of my eye, I see a dwarf. Powerful trunk, half-length legs. A gringa smiling a smile I pray is never on my face. How do you meet the Other? Again, he looks at me. And again explosion and fire, then water over my head like baptism. The face at the mother’s breast. I approach the man with his stamp, his questions. My love navigates down the ramp two full duffel bags, one on each shoulder. Mechanical legs propelling him, first one then the other. I • 128 don’t know what to do. Run forward and cry, you are man enough to love me. Stopped by the guards, the border. With gallant he saunters through the door. It’s true I’ve been sick, brought again violently to the body. I curled in that dark foreign bed in Antiqua so foetal I breathed on my own self. Like prayer to my own heart, own sex, O Love am I really going to die without meeting you? Loneliness is breaking me. O Love. Soldier. Guerrilla. Torture victim, your commanders overthrown, armies disbanded, you could meet me now. I could trust enough to cry in your arms. I could be your legs. Face of the enlightened one who has nothing to lose but life itself, you could love me too. ...