BY SERGIO A. ORTIZ
As If from Nowhere
Miguel Angel’s memories haunt him
like a baggage car that does not quite fit.
But let's talk about his voice,
somewhat faded by the years,
as if words were spying on him.
As if there were no throat
only the spoils of a race war
hidden somewhere in the towers
of New York City.
He talks about his mother
who is in her 90's and lives
on the beaches of Rincon.
Talks about the wife
and grandchild he’s left behind.
Suddenly, death is him
and this is the ferry's last stop.
Miguel Angel from nowhere
the world becomes numerous,
but the cold keeps its stories.
The Shame and Fear We Sow
It’s no longer Build the Wall
or Lock Her Up, now it’s Shoot the Bitch.
and Hang the Nigger.
Outbursts, newsworthy metaphors,
one more fire under Nowhere Bridge,
a contemptible distraction
to my support of The Water Protectors?
I’m done listening to loudspeakers
announce our descent into hell. It’s a show
of strength to be a woman,
a successful black man. Why run
through the corridors
of the West Wing cherry-picking slogans
for a lynch mob?
The Sand and the Forgotten on this Side of the Border
Fuck A Wall
America should build a big mirror
Anonymous Protester
We hope the dead reconcile
with the dead, so they may achieve
a position among their peers.
May the student and the lady in a Stetson
make the same mistakes.
And the victim cross the street
side by side with his eternal executioner
without recognizing him.
Shadows or ghosts, both shall pass.
On the sidelines, the feast of the living
is still happening. Listen to the slight music
of the mountains of exile in silence
and don't look back.
This, and not another, is our story:
The time contemplated in the fissures of the sand,
The slow ripening of deserts without limit.
Alexzander Hamilton’s Broadway Dispute
What deepening twilight—scum floating atop of the waters
To the States, by Walt Whitman
bien-pensants
with fingers in your ears
and fears unheard ...
our founding fathers
are unapologetic
Sergio A. Ortiz is a gay Puerto Rican poet and the founding editor of Undertow Tanka Review. He is a two time Pushcart nominee, a four time Best of the Web nominee, and a 2016 Best of the Net nominee. His poems have been published in hundreds Journals and Anthologies. He is currently working on his first full length collection of poems, Elephant Graveyard.