The Chilean Coup

of last September

I see you O my people

in the streets

and in the passageways

               of night.

I see

your frightened faces

like posters, peeling from walls

soon forgotten

in the no-where time

that follows the insistent knock

upon the door.

I no longer hear your voices

for a thousand hurting cries

have filled my ears

–       and echo still

between my yesterday

              and your tomorrow.

 I remember your September smells

from years gone by.

Cannot forget the acrid smell

                          of tear gas

and exploding shells

that cleared our city streets

hiding the sun

beyond a blackened sky.

              And you ask me why I leave you

    when we shared our food together

    when you hid me in the daytime

    in the darkness of your cellar.

    And you ask me where I’m going

    as I rise above the mountains

    on a one way ticket eastward

    from my home.

I go from here to exile

to try to put together

the tired and troubled pieces

of my mind.

December 1973: 

redrafted September  1995