Glyphs

stone rooms

filled with Mayan dreams—

the wings

of frightened swallows

beat against my chest

Chaak the rain god’s

blackened face

rising

over the temple steps

a double rainbow

a jade mask

for a dead king . . .

in the window

of the tourist bus

the beggar’s face

crutches

on cobblestone . . .

the boy

with the withered foot

hawks used shoes

an altar stone

grooved for the flow of blood . . .

in each little shop

an armed guard

struts his shotgun

the sun god’s

nightly passage

through a two-headed snake—

I dream of finding

the second mouth

wisps

of smoke rising

from a ritual fire

we cleanse ourselves—

these bundles of rue

flower water

in a plastic bottle

tucked

in my carry-on

the shaman’s essence

Atlas Poetica 14, March 2013

~Impressions of our trip to Mayan sites in Belize, Guatemala, and Honduras in November 2012.