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3.  T h e   S o u n d s   o f   D e v i l s

From the depths of hell itself,

in the suffocating glare

of the afternoon, the burros

pull the wobbling carts

of cinnabar.  With but half

of their workday behind them,

drenched with sweat,

they shine like dark,

faceted crystal twisted

in the sun.  Every night

for weeks, after retiring

as a miner, too sick to work

and dying in the cool adobe

house of his aunt in Mexico,

he’ll wake burning with fever

and sweating from his fitful sleep

to the sounds of devils

belting out the arias

of hell: the sounds

the dazzling burro makes

dying in the bright Texas sun.