We've left the crib, the family

animals, the unstable first trinity.

Forgiven the all night journeys

made in haste, the rough beds,

the secrets and baffling dreams. Since

our father left us, his words

in our ears orate a baritone

poetry, wild and strong enough

to hold the yes and the no.

Again the sun leans toward its death

and our mother grows small.

Her forehead curves under

our hands like a child's.

In her daughters’ touch

she finds babies,

long birth, the stars and songs.

Before its end, her life blooms into myth.

She will leave behind attar of roses,

a portrait on blue fabric, her face

in the cliff s. We live and we die

but she will be assumed,

we are certain, like goddesses

everywhere. She waits. She will light

the clouds in her long passage.

Feast of Guadalupe, Dec 12