1962

I made the kites
myself using
onion paper
the color
of dream
jungles.

With the arrival
of the trade winds
in December
I flew kites at dusk
in Recostadero Park
where Barranquilla’s
sweethearts met.

The days
flew by
like kites
in the wind.
At night,
exhausted from kite-flying,
I lay in my bed
neither boy nor man
and night-dreamed
with a kite that flew
all the way to the bloody
moon of the tropics
while below,
on planet earth where
I lived,
all the glaciers melted
all the seas overflowed
and the African continent
went up in flames.

Published in Gival Press, 2005