Hidden Park
Hidden Park
is the low-rent start of
my American story
my childhood apart–
I remember
the flagpole lawn was never green
the laundry room was never cleaned
always someone there by the pool
complex kids those days not in school
their voices reached our balcony
their games and laughter, their community
I remember
my ankle cuffed to bike and chain
locked inside my room, my brain
a single immigrant mother’s backup care
who would care to notice or interfere
when every family has to go it alone
who is left behind, who has to stay home
who can go outside, who gets to play
could you teach yourself to escape
Hidden House
is where I live with
my patch of sky
my batch of kids
I watch them jump in leaves and climb
frozen hands warming to south sunlight
whimsy freed, fancy taking flight
I remind them not to run out of time
waiting for the paved path to clear
November rain after autumnal fear
grackles fly higher for rarified air
rising up against noise everywhere
shifting clouds storming into view
breaking cycles and breathing anew
I know now
memory is yours and mine to lose
slow down and it is easier to choose
the sound of thinking in reading rooms
friends drinking to the beaver moon
hidden open
is my still beating heart
my bare-knuckled dreams
my bonfire sparks
can’t be found through a frictionless screen
can’t be bought for billionaire schemes
dwelling in the duality, the in-between
of what human is and what life means
I cannot speak what you want to see
or paint you a picture of certainty
but my calloused feet can learn to skate
travail the distance from idea to place
my foreign tongue, my tangled nose
have tasted home on plate or bowl
unreeling notions of name and face
these restless fingers dare to create
vociferous voice with surfeit to say
silent, starving for real landscape
still I read
and rhyme the signs
find rhythm rippling through every line
still I write
and reach for the sublime
content to let joy and death intertwine
I draw circles back
rewinding time, redesign the future
remake my mind