LatinosUSA

Rainy Season

In the stoic shadow of Diamondhead,
UB40 soothes an entire island with cover songs.
Underneath a groping banyan tree,
A drug dealer, car thief, and drunk driver play
Rock Paper Scissors.
Disease is 18 months in Paradise.

I rarely went to the beach,
I never had Shaved Ice,
I surfed once.
Early morning phone calls to the mainland,
I should have called more often.

This insignificant plastic baggie was no match for
Two seasoned waiters finishing their shift and starting early.
Waialae’s all uphill at 6 o’clock.
You just have to put in the strokes
Or you can be difficult and throw your bicycle up a mountain.

I couldn’t drink enough that rainy season,
I was so angry.
He had moved on, which only made me angrier at his swollen advice.
Green waves crashed at Sandy’s
Every time I heard what he had been doing,
Firecrackers from Chinatown
Woke me up that Lunar New Year.
That’s when I realized how lonely I had become
Dangling dangerously on a stranger’s lanai in the Pacific Ocean.

~~

Comic Books in Supermarkets

Caught somewhere between a transparent cassette tape
And the refresh of whatever screen I’d like to finish me,
There was a brief moment when flannel was as fierce as
Nonchalance at Bret Easton Ellis’s funeral.
Social media-chic cigarette values,
With a competitive neglect, I scroll once more.

“You won’t even break a sweat,” the caption reads flatly
In a voice that’s so unlike my own, I find it comforting.
I let my invertebrate ego do the heavy lifting, wearing
Someone else’s 501s
And the detachment that defines men
Born between the bookends of Watergate and Reagan.

Tuesday morning consent green-lighted as
I let it hold my hand in algorithm,
My personality progressively gaslit with
Every glance over either salt-crusted shoulder.
I clandestinely clad myself with perceived sleeves
Like Christopher Reeve’s dreams.

One day, they stopped selling comic books in supermarkets.
Boys who grew up in the 1980s
We measure masculinity like we were the one in every Tyson fight.
We wrapped ourselves in irony to make sure there’d
Be enough words to hit the post limit once all we have to look back on
Is a shoebox with some blurry Kodak 3x5s, date-stamped orange, bottom corner.