TWO POEMS by Alfredo Aguilar
ONE WAY IN—ONE WAY OUT
during the fire, i thought only of closed roads—
lines of cars redirected to find another way
in or out. while the mountain above them burned,
a couple jumped into their water tank to save themselves.
i turned on every sprinkler & placed a few on the roof.
i sat on top of my house, dry terrain on all sides,
breathing the ash-rain & smoke. perhaps i should have
been more concerned. perhaps i should have packed
my letters & left. perhaps i was too cavalier.
i thought myself willing to go down with the house.
it was in fact, not bravado, but a life that did not know loss.
on an old ranch, when the stables caught fire
& there was no chance of rescuing them, all the horses
were loosened. i imagined them wild eyed & panicked.
a stampede emerging from a smoke cloud. the sound
of hooves—an unsaddled stream rushing out
in a single direction with nothing but their lives.
AUBADE
my eyes were bloodshot
from finding spare hours
in the curve of your
collar bone.
you drove me to a flight
& said you hadn’t seen
a sunrise in months.
the sky—a pool
of crushed hibiscus.
i wanted to swim in it
with you. we were quiet
the way anything that leaves
is quiet. you promised
to find me
& i closed the door.
parting is never
the ceremony we wish
it were—someone is there
& then they’re not.
i sat in a terminal
& felt the sun
through large windows.
i thought of your hand
squeezing mine in sleep.
how one night you turned
away from me so that
i wouldn’t see you cry.
& later beneath a blanket
we hummed lullabies
to one another.
you placed me
in a cold empty sky not
because you wanted to,
but because i asked you to.
