I have been here before, it is no accident:
even if here is in the last dream my friend has
before waking this morning in New Bedford, MA—
I can see exactly how we walked through the main street
in our hometown across the sea, looking in the shops,
digging our hands into our jean pockets for warmth.
Here is the Chinese restaurant famous for its noodles
and egg pie, here is the barbershop with its candy-
striped light. Here in a storefront window is an old-
fashioned printing press, and maps of the Philippines
drawn in blue-green ink. Here in a snow globe,
a red-tailed hawk flies clockwise then counter-
clockwise over ruins of the ancestral home.
When I hold it in my hand and twirl it,
wind stirs up sieved tears, a storm of ice.
02 06 2013
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.
