Thursday, October 22, 2009

EL CAFE

(the closest i have ever come to doing it justice.)

I wake up every morning
to the muffled sounds
of NPR, and the clatter
of cooking pots
my mother, in the kitchen
starting out a day
that will inevitably
end in varicose veins
and another 15 loaves of bread.

My father, making coffee
tests our patience
letting the kettle scream
until my brother and i
run out of our rooms, disgruntled
to shut the burner off.

My brother, six years my elder
trapped in his room
by his own inventions,
music slipping out
from under his door,
something that he has taken to calling work
and I have taken to calling,
a pretty excuse.

Thus, the day proceeds
and we try our best
to find sounds
to fill it with.

At night, i creep down the stairs
drawn in by the soft hum
of folk music.
I watch the reflections
dance off the guitar
in rhythm, as though
they know some secret
i am too human to understand.

I lean my head on my mothers shoulder
and right before
I fall asleep I think
if these
walls
could talk
[they wouldn't talk
they'd sing,
like a gospel choir
on Christmas morning,
like they've never loved
anything as much as they love
this place]
[they wouldn't talk
they'd yell,
they'd speak in tongues,
they would shake
themselves to pieces
from the mysterious beauty
of the things that happen here.
they'd bleed magic,
the sounds of all the voices
that have filled this room
at once
like an orchestra,
but better]

I wake up long enough to tip-toe
my way up the creaky stairs,
to my bed-room
where I collapse
onto the sheets
and fall asleep to the sounds
of muffled folk music
mixed with laughter
and wait for Jean Feraca
to gently wake me
in the morning.

This must be the place.

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