Desert Crossing…

I am yaqui, pasquali, Mexican, pronghorn, sand lizard, gringo,
I and the sons and daughters of migrant dreams
Gringos come south looking for eye candy
Hot tamales and discounted medical care
Mexica’s head north
Hungry for a slice of apple pie
With dreams bought on credit
And hopes Western Unioned home each fortnight

I am four-legged
I came here looking for tender plants to feed on
And found a continent divided
The shell of turtle island scarred
Metal wall
Separates mother father
Sister brother
Lover lover

Barbed wire (made in china),
Tops concrete (mixed of Mexican sand) wall
Electric current buzz hurts my ears

Israeli drone’s night-seek body heat
Across cooling desert floor
This string of lights
Dilates pupils with artificial light
I became frozen in the glare of manmade insanity

A continent divided
Which side prison
Which side freedom
Ancient migratory journeys become international flashpoints of insanity

I am two-legged
I see
Two border towns
One thrives on methods of escape
The other killed from lack of consumable products and hatred
For who stops long enough to shop?

Make no mistake
The question is:
Are we really so different

Razor wire
Shreds more than flesh
Dreams bleed to death
On either side

I am detained at this border
I see my family over there
They dance they hope they dream
I see my family over there

Stolen beauty glorifies insanity
Mexican mosaic glass
Mimics shattered hope of a
people forced to climb walls
dodge dogs
with shattered bones from 16 foot drop
into the land of consumed, consumer dreams

I am four-legged, centuries in the making
Evolved for survival in dry heat
today my partner is over there
genetic improprieties are choices we are forced to make
This wall interferes with fine tuned replication
Evolution for survival

I see insanity from horizon to horizon
My dreams become the fluid quickening of dust gathering at dusk

Deer is Mexican is yaqui is mother is father is life is search for food
is search for diversity is lost partner is eating plants is hope detained

There was a time when humans followed our migratory trails
Traded jungle blue feather for sun baked pottery

The Yaqui and Tohono O’Odham
Read our trail and droppings
Knew when to start, when to stop
And when to return home

the sun and the moon take turns rising
earth maker has to set an order to existence
each creation story has a flood
earth maker has to set an order to existence
this ocean of heat was once water

this border, this boundary
created by man, not by earth maker
divides father from son
wife from husband
sister from sister

The ancient calendars and visions of the curandero
Foretold the loss of truth
The loss of life
Hands of babies chopped
Virgin bodies mutilated
Warriors’ heads on sticks
Each mote of dust
Each thorn of cacti
Is a prayer of remembrance

Each mote of dust each thorn of cacti tells a story of human violence and greed
The gentle sway of to and fro demolished
Clan separated from clan
Child lost from mother
this manmade barrier stops earth maker’s flow
stops Earth maker’s order for the universe

In the silence between each breath of existence
You can hear the sun rise
You can hear
The seismic shifts of earth’s inner core
Begging for forgiveness
In this silence you can hear
Puma’s last breath
A child’s deep yearning for home