PABLO DEAR PABLO 
   (for Neruda) 

Pablo dear Pablo
I've seen your songs
on the skies of my country
oozing out screams
of Chilean birds
oozing out peasant sweat
and crimes of swordsmen
who exploited Indians
for native wheat
to mortgage the Chilean sunrise 
of bread and wet clay . . . 

Pablo dear Pablo 
your songs are the screams 
of an outraged bird 
on the skies of my country 
whose copper vultures 
ripped into the Andes 
to ship native copper 
off to Chicago
leaving the Chilean people 
with the crags and the graves . . . 

Pablo dear Pablo 
your enormous eyes 
are Chilean coins 
that peer at me 
from the skies of my country
mixing my face with your face 
your roots of red flowers 
worked deep in the soil 
your jungle-vine voice 
dead all alone 
from cancer of the flesh 
of the God-damned government . . . 

Pablo dear Pablo 
alone with your words 
your red captain face 
swells inside my face 
your red captain face 
like a trampled guitar 
laid out in the rain . . . 


© Jim Normington