For the glory of the Crown
Francis Drake sailed westward
with a competing pogrom
of purification or eradication
to wrest paradise from the gun barrels of Seville
while the Great Conquerer Dysentery
sailed confidently eastward.
Centuries later crumbling lines
of El Morro gun emplacements
were dwarfed by lines for the Ladies Room
which once was medical quarters
where the wounded were taken
to contract disease from those who treated them
or to die from Compostelas of bullet
to be laid down with white rum in their eye sockets
lime where lungs had been
sugar-crust in rotted boot-heels
Tabonuco seedlings sprouting through occipital gap
& ice water spilled on the ground
where they had bled to death
by a gardener from Ft. Worth.
The dreamed-of future for which they traded
acts of heroism & acts of cowardice
were torrid short-lived affairs,
melodramas told by a corrupt historian
-- whether slain or expired
with names soon to be forgotten
save the pursemakers of Drake & Ponce de Leon
in whose defense they had journeyed far
with code of honor or grudging obedience
to accept that history was be defined
by soldier ancestors of Lorca killers,
their gun barrels from Seville
one day poised to ask a post-colonial
¿Quiere mojito, senorita?
Death by mojito then.
From Lorca’s little cart,
ethanol of Bimini & cante jondo
no princely oblation
no Queen’s sleeve lowered at the instant of sacrifice
no Inquisitor's rod
no Song of the Little Death sung across Española
by those who today sasay the inner defenses.
27 March 2012
San Juan, P.R.