The Literary Review
Heart of Stars
astronomers discover radio signal “heartbeat” from across universe — mit, 13 july 22
a single heartbeat
revealing repeating
billions of light years away
passionate pulsing
the heart’s pounding
is a song carried this far this long
to my eavesdropping
astronomers heard it first
they assert
it’s radio waves
from neutron stars impossibly far
now they’ll grasp how fast
we’re expanding exploding dispersing
disappearing
in a stellar wind
seekers proclaim order
in frequencies sorted
high low above below
they know
what it should mean to me
hearing seeing
cancer radiation being
numbers along waves spectrum
science-deafened heartbeat-lessened
i hear a provocative
rhythm driven
across the universe
echoing seduction
we meld in neutron eruption
radiating our own magnetic waves
another billion years
they will listen with intuition
imagine our passion unfastened
reaching the future
in a resonant
imploding
heartbeat …
it must have stopped by now
it must have stopped
Adobe Oven
I twist my body to squeeze my belly
between the greasy gas range
and yellow-tiled sink counter.
Curse the pendejo who
crammed the kitchen
into an 8×8 box.
Wedge my torso into the cranny by the front door
to escape my sweaty, cramped apartment.
Outside my adobe cave, the West Texas summer
sends a dust devil down my street, tumbleweed in tow.
“Ay! Que calor!” a woman tells me
as she wobbles past.
“Tórrido,” I agree
watching ripples rise from burnt asphalt
where an ancient arroyo once spread.
Weary from 10 hours scouring hotel-suite baños,
her short, heavy legs force her body
further uphill.
Beyond her, the raw sienna rocks
of the Franklin Mountains
open the pass that names the dilating city
stolen from the desert’s domain.
Like angry javelinas,
new malls and nightclubs,
casas y calles
dart into the dusty kiln
of prickly pear and mesquite,
breach the Chihuahuan Desert.
Once a yucca or saguaro thrived
where the concrete front stoop
burns my thighs.
I survey the barrio corner where I live,
inhale menudo from down the street.
Taste sweat that trickles down my face
and wonder if cacti and rattlers
will ever
reclaim their land.
Angel On the Roofie
listen here I knew
your song was in the sky
and when I took it down
strange things began to happen
- Gary P English
How to Invent a Life
you were such a bright spot in the universe
your pictures and words your colors
and sounds
are pure light
I keep seeing you
on the streets
of the east village
in the building
in my head
you reverberate
and remain
El Paso Dream
Juarez tethers me like a balero
with a bridge instead of string.
I tread Stanton Street’s crammed path
over the nearly waterless Rio Grande.
I could have walked on its dehydrated bed.
Tanned leather’s weathered smell
infuses the mercado’s air.
Piñatas, penuche.
Day of the Dead disguises and candles,
coupled like an afterlife marriage,
entice tourists to a tienda.
Street vendors
make mariachi marionetas dance
— ¡baila, baila! —
like I’ll never be able to.
Still, I hand over my pesos.
Now I possess a tangle of string,
wooden legs, tiny guitar.
I’ll figure it out when I get home … quizás.
I stop at a corner bar for Negra Modelo,
risky time for beer.
La Linea y Los Aztecas, Los Mexicles y Artistas Asesinos —
and a hundred more gangs
whose names I can’t remember —
own the Juarez streets at night.
I’m a gabacho; I must leave.
Windless and weak,
I pant on my bicycle up Scenic Drive
past the painted white “A” on the Franklin Mountains.
Gabriel is with me, Sylvia and Arturo, Melchor y Timo —
but we never come here together.
Now images rapid fire like a cartel’s AR-15s:
Sun Bowl, Sunland Park, Fort Bliss, Chamizal
Texas Western wins it all in ’66.
Nunchucks and knives in the halls of Austin High.
San Jacinto Plaza, alligators in central pond.
(No one knows why gators in a desert town.)
Menudo written on a wall in letters four feet tall.
No need. I can smell it four city blocks back.
My garden of prickly pears, yuccas,
barrel cactus and pampa grass.
I know it’s a dream
Like I know the El Paso I knew
is lost in desert dust:
A winding tumbleweed, thrown by West Texas wind.
Still jumbled.
Still gone.
Good-bye
Her Viking ship cradles her, anticipates flaming arrows. I linger
beside her: Her quest to become an angel haunting
like demons. An organ’s tinny notes summon me;
I leave the longship blaze. Friends allege:
She’ll be an angel now. Empty
words I know aren’t true.
Angels can’t fly from
wildfire so eternal:
ashes imprison
ashes.