I.
Raise your whistle
to the onion moon.
A man weaving tule baskets,
another, bamboo
traps. Ducks
on Lake Zumpango
seek amaranth crests
in groves of tea.
Carp (death) on a stick.
Night calls.
Conches and reeds;
songs barred by the past.
The owls dance,
wings spread for tribute.
Hospice of aromas,
sweet corn, chili
fire, brine shrimp,
the fertility of the earth,
water sanctification,
that relentless hummingbird
with his laminated watch
and white fan.
II.
Chinampas, black amphibian
islands.
As a volcano’s mouth
shares the ocean’s cup,
there are hours of passage,
and drunken fruit-sellers
transfixed by song.
Streets embrace
the beacons and bodies
of ancestors welcomed
by these hollow hands.
Catch the rains
with a forest of scepters,
ahuehuetes, altar builders,
and water to store
more children for spring.
III.
The days are markets, markets.
The stars, rotundas of salt.
Drowned stone vessels
and offerings of smoke
return to the fire
obsidian’s thirst.
As the source of Tepeyac,
the waters give joy,
and will fully restore
an integral sky.
At last, the days are apples,
the sentinels, rain,
frogs and salamanders
my perpetual destiny.
Where the sun meets the building’s sharp corner
when it carries on its back the noon of a lake,
there is a refreshing chastity,
as if the day invented geometry.
Cloudy water for the light to drink
from a celestial well,
or a muddy lagoon of glaucous cephalopods.
Place of stone, freshwater sea,
innocuous redemption,
pharmacy of angels and herders,
those remedial waters
and sun on the walls.