#213 / 2011 Oaxaca June: My Tribute Poem

REMEMBERING OAXACA

#213

Remembering Oaxaca

I visualize six-inch stilettos

on five-hundred year old cobblestones;

the zocolo plaza

obscured by blue tarps

sheltering teachers

protesting inequality by day,

sleeping on cardboard by night.

Six years before

striking teachers were machine gunned

from overhead helicopters

sent by the governor. Bravely

they march shoulder to shoulder.

I recall Santo Domingo de Guzman

a majestic Mexican Baroque temple

built in 1575 and the beggars

outside, alongside

the  most expensive tour guides in town.

Along the route de la Republica

many generations are represented

by this Parade of Heroes, glorified men

honored with concrete statues in their images, all

adorned by scarlet-eyed pigeons.

Sebastian Lerdo de Tejada

Mariano Escobedo

Angel Albino Corzo

Ign ácio Rameriz

General Ignacio Pesqueira Garc ía

Ignacio Zara Goza

Francisco Zarco

Imperiously they gaze down upon me.

I feel insignificant.

Tuesday night at Café Babel

Juan Gonzales hosting open mic;

my beautiful yoga teacher Laurie Thompson

smoking cigaraettes, downing mezcal;

me, too.

I never get a hangover

I tell Laurie

“It is all in the ‘espiritu’”

she said.

Alejandro on the bongos, guitars

Late in the night I stand in the doorway watching

fat raindrops on wet streets

as  I wait for a taxi to pass by.

Here I feel significant.

I remember  the market, the shops, me carrying bags

as I pass by an old beggar women by the church.

She is tiny with her twig arms outstretched

“Tengo hambre,” she pleads.

“I am  hungry.”

I scurry past her

my bulging shopping sacks

brushing past her rags and bones.

I am far too encumbered

with my purchases

rugs, vases, linens;

my hands are too occupied

to dig out any change I might have.

It would be too awkward.

I am awkward as I hurry past her

with no eye contact.

Never

have I felt so small.

I am the ugly American.