Albino Carrillo

A Ghost Explains How He Passes from This World to the Next

The past as a memory

of the past, the last time

prophets like Kachinas

spoke to you in the mountains

above the casino

the reconstruction not quite

like a campfire

but not as the woods were either.

If there is something sullen

at your disposal, let me know--

I’d take the lake, that one in western

New York. Although

lately I've been thinking

of the waffle iron,

of clear French glass

which held cool beverages.

***

Doña Ana County & Beyond

I could smell the freshly cut

alfalfa at my grandmother's farm in Hatch,

that night ate fresh roasted corn & green chile

from an iron skillet she kept

hanging on a nail

next to the outdoor fire pit.

I can tell you I've driven

in the desert in the middle

of the night looking

for nothing except

the one great galaxy you can see

in the hills outside 

Tucson when there is no

moon and the dry

desert hurts your eyes,

even at night. 

And, if you need to know, my brother and I hunted

blue bellied lizards, horned

toads, red as the Gallup

hills, into the far afternoons

of distant Dinétah.

When my abuelito played

his fiddle, it was for bar gigs

for weddings--he possessed

a talent from the stars

but was far away

unknown, by day the postman

in Las Cruces. 40 years

of mail. He had a garden

that rivaled Babylon.

Thick red roses, irises, hollyhocks,

pecan and chinaberry

trees. That's all gone

now. And I am left to

write about the fate

of my friends and children

in this fiery life I stumbled

upon. One spring morning

when it was raining hard,

large drops, the sky was

black-green, free of life.

Listen:  right now, of

all things, Pachelbel

is playing on the radio

in the kitchen. I am in Ohio

with that woman

I met at the height

of the storm. My soul

remains scorched

by the New Mexico

sun, the high altitude,

the threat of radiation.

***

Calculations Done Under the Stars

The earth and macadam

painted your bare feet

like thunder clouds

in mid July display. That

your eyes

would be ashamed

not to take

me in. That I am

a ghost or will

be and somehow need

your experience to guide

me, for now. The road

is broken. By fate

your road and mine

have met on a stretch

of land neither of us

ever imagined. From

all the darkness, of

night, of the thin soul,

I have arrived in light

alongside you, in

this hallway, merely

talking. Is there

not something

I’ve always seen in you?

One word

describing the nameless

stars weeping over

their own nakedness,

one word

that is not yet breathed

for we both fear the lies

the yellow moon tells in August.

We are both here--

on this road

looping like a möbius strip,

on this road that returns

us to the granite facts

of loneliness, the plaintive

confession that all's

not as right as it should be,

that the morning glories

blooming in the hot, early sun

mean more than the nameless skies.

***

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