The Blossoming World


If you were alive I would give you the poem about you
in the plaza that year. February in Mexico, jacaranda flowers
falling all around, you squatted beside the ceramic jars smoking
a Delicado. I caught you with the cords from your hat tied loose

under your chin, your white shirt spotted with tree shadows.
We were sad, then we were happy, moving in and out of the
patterns of water from the well where the burros drank.

Waiting for the big trucks to quiet down, you sipped a beer,
I sketched you from behind your ear and then full face.
You talked to the man who owned the store, leaned against the post.
Two kingbirds sat side by side on a telephone line just over your head.

Like love birds. That’s when I knew what you meant about light.
Because it was pouring down on us
from an upturned lake, washing the long walls,
the open gates and the horses. If I stepped

closer to you I would smell your hands. I didn’t. Your hands
made of light held the brush that moved color across
the water.

You boarded the bus to Guadalajara.
It rained.