Mutal
Or Tikal, whichever you will
I guessed right on the first try,
unwanted adaptations, close behind,
overshot my right of passage into rat races,
‘Tikal’ when I roll up my black laces,
drenched, the yellow of still water and sweat,
it was too convenient to turn to prayer
by the time it was up to my pale neck,
familiar voices from underneath took haven for my ears,
I heard less by the time I breached onto cold shores,
read the brown leaves carried in the world’s cursive,
but the white noise was more patient,
the suburbs and rural out-coves do scream,
the city penetrates the night’s thick hide,
I knew the point of origin to silence,
and remember darkness without compromise,
good sleep was an empty explicat;
millions of nameless victims not yet laid to rest,
no, I caught something else.
This is the eighth poem, “MUTAL,” from my fourteenth poetry collection, EXPLICATIONS: ANZALDUA & SATANTANGO. This collection is going through multiple revisions for the type of work I wanted to capture. For the most part, I have settled on replicating the style and prose of a novel AND a film adaptation of a novel: Gloria Anzaldua’s, La Frontera, and Bela Tarr’s, Satantango. This poem offers some commentary on modern living spaces, however, with subtle allusions to indigeneity and pre-colonial life in the Americas. What does it truly mean to rest?
— Chicano poet from Southern California
