Memory Immigration Poems

A Child at Tornillo

Telling my story makes it real
Brings it into existence
What I thought I knew
What I know now
Wasn’t real
No matter how 

Well intentioned
Well thought...

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The table is old and worn
nicks and scratches 
its red plastic tablecloth left over from a forgotten Christmas
its holiday pattern worn and forlorn
many a Thanksgiving...

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Ghosts in Gray Rains.
All along the rain swept street
Crowed With Ghosts of Lost Sovereign thoughts.
Shadows are carved hard, 
sharp by
Neon Bars. 
My mind wanders in...

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A creosote frown mars
the stony landscape.
Time’s sundial remnant
a tilting chimney shadow
circling a homestead memory.

The foundation survives
the dream remains
tangled in ivied struggle
longing for the sound of...

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walking down a one-way path 
straight with the moon over one shoulder 
following the tracks 
as they lead into the horizon 
following the faded imagery...

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Looking back, one thing comes clean-glass clear
you were always there for me subduing every fear.

I tried to do my duty, be a husband strong and...

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I never know what will happen…what memories I’ll see
but I love when my imagination merges with my memory.

My memory picks a person…sometimes quite randomly
and my...

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I am a sprite pixie lost in the vast plain of tomorrow

Plain simple and impish and easy to find in my sorrow

A true spirit I...

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The Garden at Grandma’s

The house is quiet, the chores are all done. 
We have gathered in the place out back. 
There is pit for a...

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Oi be nowt but an auld country hick,
we a liddle bit of gall, an a lotta stick.
Oi baint niver afeared to speak me mind,
nor critizise...

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Only my soul see the seasons when I am alone  
Wearing the camouflage of a mocking frown, 
The frock grows longer when I am...

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Sometimes, I want to tell you.
Laying by your side, it’s a mystery to explain
Why I gave up my poetry for so long.

It’s a mystery to...

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The monks gave me a bag of Thai oranges
Before I left for the States.

Next time I come, I’ll have learned more Lao,
I promise.

  ...

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When I am in your home,
I am back to Laos after a lifetime.
I am in a place beyond words:

      ...

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Land of the free???



Give me your tired, your poor
Your huddled masses, yearning to breath free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shores,
Send those, the homeless,
Tempest-toss to...

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