The Most Precious Resource

Already gone,

My brothers, my sisters,

Who love me,

Whom I love.

When you think you have all the time in the world,

That’s when it hurts the most.

When you think you know when they’ll go,

And you find out they’re already gone.

People are the most precious resource in the world.

Completely exhaustible,

Almost never forgettable.

They entered my heart in a parade

Of flowered traditional dancers and gentle thoughtful movements.

But they were ripped from me

Like Huascar’s unborn child from the womb.

Such beauty and love they don’t even realize,

Means so much so me, as I walk away wiping my eyes.

They are simply who they are.

No masks, no charades, no facades,

Or poker faces playing strategic cards.

They opened right up to me,

Allowing my eyes and heart to see their realities.

They don’t know how much I love what I saw.

How I’m in awe,

That a family can love so much and hurt so little,

That despite is all, they can fall

Into a coexistence of joy,

That for the rest of us is a riddle.

Really I think I’ve let them down.

I will remember them forever,

But I’m just one of their SST whatevers.

Sure I’m part of the family—for two weeks.

Then I’m off with memories that will never be forgotten,

Leaving them with just a hat, a mix CD, and a chess set I’d boughten.

They are role models,

They are Christ figures,

They are light in the dark,

They are true lovers.

I hate goodbyes because I know they are important,

Because they are what you remember,

Until next time—if there is a next time.

If there’s not, goodbyes really are everything.

And in that moment, my everything fell to pieces.

And they are worth more than my everything all together.

Gracias, y Te Amo.

Celestino, Inés, Caleb, Abby, Lisi, Erik.

The Dúnadan

I wonder willingly

Through the minds

Of friends and neighbors,

Lovers and strangers,

Abusers and saviors.

Through lands unknown,

And the house I own.

I willingly wander

Because the world is a vast place of wonder.

Each shape with new curves,

Each man a master he serves,

Each child a bright future they deserve.

But each new place with a similar face,

Fitting into all the same molds,

How unique the people,

Though the pattern is old.

So much in those places to learn,

From the withering grandma,

And the stray piece of straw,

Floating delicately, deliberately, on the wind,

Twisting, maneuvering, in trend.

The trend of nature

The trend of Earth,

Found in every dancing glance

And every magical birth.

Not all those who wander are lost.

We choose by the wind to be tossed.

We know the grandeur in a playful smirk.

We know the beauty in the unnoticed dirt.

We wander to see and learn,

To love and slowly turn,

To soak in all the world,

And embrace each step with banners of wonder unfurled.

How It Seams

Too many broken souls
too many people with holes...in their hearts.
Some trying to start,
Some falling apart,
Because there's no hope left.
The old man's blind and half deaf,
The woman has one leg,
but instead of helping he buys a keg,
or maybe just a 12-pack,
Sits on the street with his buddies and tries to forget,
that night attack.
Where everything changed,
and people were maimed,
And police treated them like pieces in a game,
Senderista or not it was all the same.

And now on with life they sit torn,
begging for money and looking for porn,
(although they don't have to look far,
just head to the nearest billboard,
or the sign in the corner store)
Overlooked and forgotten are the downtrodden,

And who are you and who am I,
to play around with the disguise
that we can relate and we can help?
When we come from a country
where our biggest worry
is paying off
the unneeded things we already bought.

Here, sometimes life stands still,
and people just hope not to get killed,
just want to live another day,
not for themselves but for their family.
For their 8-year-old boy,
who will end up living the same cyclic life,
unless they work themselves to the bone all day,
come home and drink off the pain,
pull together enough soles to pay,
the school whose director has wifi.
Who hired college students to teach for free,
and gives parents a guarantee,
their kids will absolutely earn a degree.
While they pile studnets' hard work in a mess,
treat grades like the teachers' best guess,
forging progress with every impossibly hard test.
Just trying to relieve the educational stress,
but what they really relieve
is the chance of real success, the chance at a dream.

And here we are acting like a blessing,
when really we're just acquiescing
to a broken system of broken promises,
broken hearts and broken dreams.
Yes, that's how it seems,
when your actually in the seam.