Post Parting

almost two weeks now
Dad has gone to parts
unknown though i feel
him wherever i go

the most haunting when
Alexa at Toni's house
started singing without
being cued and a blues
song about sin and crossing
Jordan came on, my Dad's
last name Jordan and he was
a Baptist preacher, oh, he
is around all right watching
over my mother, checking on
me in new ways, i feel
less of a loss i think than
those of my kin who believe
in a far away heaven where they
will join him some day what we
know is little, but people keep
telling me they felt him close
when they saw one of his favorite
birds, a cardinal come and sing
to them, when i heard affirmations
from him when i was writing his
funeral poems, is it true i have
an extra advocate unseen helping
well if it's not true than i'm 
not hurting myself much to feel him near

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Nawlins

streets still torn
mattress-filled dumpsters
lining construction site
houses one in ten redone
the haves still standing
tall and beautiful streetcar
reminds me of my childhood
in Brazil where jumping
on was the mode of transportation
men hanging off the sides unlike
here where tourists and workers
ride enclosed and people cross
the tracks unaware of each other’s
sorrows we gather with our loved
ones, missed so long embracing
grand kids not the tourist traps
that want our bucks a wedding
for the magazines jazz band
marching to some forgotten loving
way to jump the broom a culture deep
a way oppressed now displayed but still
not honored my heart is broken open
sweet grief and joy mingle down the
river walk and bourbon street spills
neat beating to the dance of our family’s sweet feet

Weird Christmas

it’s been a weird Christmas
my family of origin strange
in their stuffology my wife
alone here all our children
live in other places as far
away from this home as you
can get and still be in the
same country, migraines come
often here too much food, they
eat as recreation lacking forms
of other entertainment
like new movies, walking
beaches and the feeling that
there is money to spend for
a great night out

This morning grandmother moon
arose resplendent her arms
outstretched touched me but
my micah’s pain too deep for
touching a lover’s pain some
times too much to bare what
is this place? of ninety year
old parents, almost twin sisters
as strange as another planet
i call out to all i know that
is familiar to the divine unchanging
to tree spirits and the sound of
reality beyond these physical dreams

i look for redemption…another birthing
i have seen many, mine and have been mid-wife
for others wait patiently to see the Truth
i know in the bones of my bones hear God
where before i would have heard only silence
know vision is like a whisper of the truth
that angels flutter around here with their
soft words and bodies of light messengers
sent to this planet to heal the broken
hearted for we are the ones open to change