by Rosa Alcalá
for my father, José Alcalá García
The salute
of this poem
rides open
to a shotgun —
I carry grief
blatant
as propaganda.
My father’s name
lifts
the hammer
bucket
brick
to eye
level
& makes everyone
a bit uneasy
for what’s
to come:
a parched code
a cracked
body
’s final test.
It’s a Dallas
of suspicion
a ramshackle
conspiracy
of origins
that hides
a mother
so central
to the narrative
and fuses
time & again
melancholy to elegy
to bring the madre
patria back
to civil war.
This ditty
like Annabelle Lee
holds the beat
every foreigner
can tap his foot to.
But whose feet
will be put
to the fire
for a democratic state?
When lost
in the sway
of our sorrow?
the flag
of our own names?
Last updated December 08, 2022