Aurelio’s Vengeance, Puerto Rico, 1901
La luz de la luna,
cuando no mata, inflama.
—Puerto Rican proverb
Very early in the
morning in the wet bushes
waiting for the coqui song
to rise crescendo so he
could torch the grand
old
house.
The red mist that
had followed him
through the forest night
had
disappeared.
He was alone. Mind is
drifting
recalling old stories
Rufino the shark killer
defeated sharks in furious
underwater battles with
just a knife and a sacred
totem.
Where is my packet
of yerba Buena he
checks his pockets all’s well
it’s
there he looks to the
river where Hippolito
killed himself as so
many
others so
many faces gone to
the river or hung
themselves from ceibas in the
tiempo
muerto/dead time the
long jobless stretch of
desert after the sugar harvest
zafra/zafra time to
dance and drink and bet
small wages on cock
fights.
The full moon
illuminates the back
of the house he watches
and
thinks I am Rufino I am
the Tainos who discovered
that Spaniards were not
gods
Spaniards could be
drowned and they sat
with the body for 3 days
just
to be absolutely sure.
I am going to burn the
house of this bastard
patron and the Americans
won’t
lift a finger to come
after me they are so busy
too busy some are trying to
help
others are behaving worse
than the Spaniards what
is this word they use,
nigger?
He freezes.
Noise of footsteps across
pebbles/it is OK it’s
Gabriel stumbling home singing
and farting loud enough to
wake anyone in the house
there is no motion from the house
he
takes the sticks covered
with rags and pitch moves
silently to back of
house
match
torches
poof.
These are
the flames of hell
you bastard you won’t
be back to enslave my family any
more nunca
jamas
nunca
jamas.
Rick Kearns Morales |
