Citadel
Welcome to the measured town
full of stone angels
full of whispers
rotten footsteps and branches
full of no words full of
vanishing gateways to nowhere
Welcome boys and girls
follow me across
nice aligned trees and boxed-in streets
lookout
who knows what’s among high grass
on that abandoned yard
don’t smell torn dry bouquets
don’t touch that sorcery gift to someone
or it is
a little broken shoe left out in the open?
Do not approach just in case
but welcome, girls and boys
melancholic or raged
forget your tiny troubles
those ideas someone else put on you
the air is stormy the sky is gray
over the citadel
oh what stories behind every word
of love and sorrow
please pass along do not see
the secret words
of love and sorrows
not yet
be careful with that marble, boy
your great-great-grandmother
polished it to exhaustion
her legacy to you
(she will come tomorrow to clean up
after rain
after pretenses, after loud noise
everyone’s make)
quiet, please
she still drags a weak body here
and on his knees polishes time
with her old bristle brush
for you, for me.
what stories, girls and boys
but keep them to yourself
or forgot them
because in the citadel every word is a bone
every silence is a thread
to the poor men behind their metal chair
and empty bags
to the rich men behind their lonely estates
and dirty coins
to the boys and the girls
to any color, any race
to any dream of who you are
’cause here…
