Partying with The Virgin

1 December 2006

for Imelda, wherever you are

It’s early December,

when cold rain begins

to lash the city I left behind

snow rests heavy

on your rocks and trees,

and here we are

in Granada, Nicaragua

crossing the street

to walk in what’s left of the shade,

comparing processions

through our two neighborhoods

these last few days:

my Xalteva, ancient indigenous

pathway to volcanoes,

your Calzada,

leading to the lovely, filthy lake,

where you won’t be caught alone past dark.

They call it La Purisima,

their game of hide-and-seek

with Maria Auxiliadora

along eight dark streets –

one each night –

spokes of the city’s wheel.

All you have to do to be loved like that,

is to stay as chaste as you were born

through all the number of your days -

too late for us already.

La Virgen smiles with old world benevolence

on the mischief of these sanctioned thieves

spiriting her away to the edges of the city

before dawn nine mornings running,

then seeing her safely home

to the cathedral every night,

where her return is greeted with explosions

that remind me of a war

I never had to live through here,

half my life ago. How the time flies.

Nowadays everybody’s welcome.

A few bold tourists play their unsteady

role in the antics, beer bottles held aloft,

big guts outthrust. We laugh politely

with the residents of one more place

we’re trying to call home.