March 2019
Note: I’m an immigrant. I came to the United States the legal way, but always felt benevolently toward those whose passage here was more turbulent than mine. The theme of borders has been a part of my writing since the 1980s, and has often tempted repetition, as much as I try to move on to new ideas. This poem comes from around 2011, a time I used to like stopping at a Mexican supermarket (which no longer exists) and entering another culture for a few minutes inside it. While we read many statistics related to border crossings, the situation demands some graphic details to be understood.
Cheap Mangos
There’s an easy flow of music through
the speakers at the supermercado
where papayas ripen while you watch
their skins disintegrate
the way a man’s skin does
when he’s found on his back in the desert
facing the sun with his mouth locked
between a scream and a prayer. His trouser leg
is torn where a coyote
came to gnaw at his thigh
and of his right forearm only
the bones remain, while on his left wrist
a watch still measures time.
The music has a teardrop in its beat
and nostalgia in the singer’s voice
but the juice aisle is a happy place
with any flavor you’d remember
from a trip across the border
going south to a colorful village
with peppers stacked in the market
just like these red, green, yellow ones
displayed in the order of their bite,
a village likely similar
to one the woman left
whose sweater clings to what remains
of her where she collapsed
in a pair of sports shoes good for many
more miles with the tread on their soles
and Just Do It style. Something pulled at her hair
where her scalp peeled away
but the strap on her brassiere
is indestructible as the belt
that falls slack where the flesh has wasted
from her hips. Had she made it
to a road she might have found
her way to Phoenix, to the store
where the cakes in the cold case
are churrigueresque, and mangos
are two for ninety-nine cents.
© 2019 David Chorlton
Editor's Note: If this poem(s) moves you please consider writing to the author (email address above) to tell him or her. You might say what it is about the poem that moves you. Writing to the author is the beginning of community at Verse Virtual. It is very important. -FF