Scot Siegel

Santa Fe, Fiesta
 
           September 11, 2011
 
 1.
One gnaws a roasted pork leg, ropes
            my stare
from across the lawn
 
            of the town square. Full-bodied
and brown,
 
     she’s beautiful.
 
 2.
Her sister, at least
            eight years younger
            squats,
 
applies tangerine
            lip-
gloss,
            tucks
her left
 
            bosom
back
            inside
 
the white vee-
            neck
tee.
 
 3.
            I am standing in the shade
of a burnt-orange
            garden wall
where Georgia
 
            O’Keeffe’s ghost
dabs yellow
            brush-
strokes
 
            from the moist
mouths
            of fresh
 
pinion
            blossoms.
 
 4.
            I wish I were
born
            in New Mexico
 
in the shadow
            of the Sangre
de Cristo;
 
            half-Pueblo,
half-Chicano,
            I could be
 
happy here.
 
 5.
When two boys meet
            on the streets of
Santa Fe
            it is a mute
 
drum-beat:
part-
            war chant
part-
 
            mariachi.
 
 6.
Here are the ripped
            shoulders of
brothers
 
            with arched
backs,
            whose forearms
 
flex,
            and whose swagger of
toothy grins,
            with fist-pumps to boot,
 
            make a white
like me
 
            jealous.
 
 7.
They meet
            at dusk
to Claps!
            of fists;
elbows knock
            knuckles
unfold
            fingers,
which like cocks’
            tail-feathers
fan-out
 
            and flutter
then duck
            then veer
to clasp
            and dive
like hawks
            embraced
in a familial
            hand-
 
shake--
 
 8.
I saw and heard the racket
            commence
across the square
            when one muttered
“Hey Brother”
            amidst the laughter
and polka
            of Fiesta--
 
9.
At first, the men converged
            like slow arrows;
but they met,
            in a quick clutch
of:
            I love ya, Bro’!
 
which echoed against
            the orange
stucco
            of a minimart;
 
            then brushed the bricks
of the Museum
            of Modern Art;
 
then refracted
 
            and were absorbed
by the four-hundred
            year-old timbers of
a conquistador’s
            palace.
 
 10.
When the women finally turned
            and grinned,
having watched the dance
            of full-grown boys
long enough,
 
the chest-shoves must have meant,
            the men would not fight,
and the women could return to
            pantomiming
the same old rumors
            and refrains
against the ash-white
            stones
of the federal
            courthouse
 
as a riot
            of Sunday nightfall
church bells
            signaled the end
of another year’s
 
Fiesta.
 
 
 
 
Scot Siegel lives in Oregon where he works as a town-planning consultant and serves on the board of the Friends of William Stafford. His most recent book of poetry is Thousands Flee California Wildflowers (Salmon Poetry, 2012). He received a fellowship-residency from Playa in 2012. His poems are anthologized in the Aesthetica Creative Works Annual (UK), Open Spaces: Voices from the Northwest (University of Washington Press, 2011), and Before We Have Nowhere to Stand (Lost Horse Press, 2012), among others. He also edits the online poetry journal Untitled Country Review. www.redroom.com/author/scot-siegel/
 
 
 
 
Return to May 2012 Edition