POETA SIN BRAZOS
           "yo, poeta sin brazos, perdido
           entre la multitud que vomita"
                      -Federico Garcia Lorca

I knelt by the knee wall
painting with black magic marker
gross defects in the hardwood

my mind overflowing
with flooding lines from Lorca
and the soft piano rites of Mose Allison

This was not the first time
I had been to the Emerald Necklace
in springtime

the red moss
tattooing the bank
like an incision filled with sand

I would visit the Priority Triangle
later that afternoon and buy my wife
a Marla harness just in case

How she loved it when at the Buttery
in our youth I quoted Yeats to her:
"I will arise and come now"

Then, I was Villon, the beloved
rogue, Horne Tooke, the shuttle
cock, Cowper, the shoe horn

"It's time for lunch," said my fey
assistant Izquierda. "For what
do you hunger?" Let's grab some