Desert Sculptures

by Henry J. Morro

We go back to the desert and I lay my head on my mother’s stomach and listen to the place where I began, when she carried me on legs that opened and burned rocks in the desert, legs balanced on swollen feet across a cracked earth.

I listen to the water beneath those feet, the water lost by bareback mothers, the water slashed from yucca roots.

I split a cactus and pour the juice on my mother’s feet. As she curls up in the sand, together we watch our skin perspire.

We become darker, our bellies soft like lizards, our fingers digging into the sand, waiting for the sun to go down.

We lie in pools of sweat, our water returning to the desert beginning the erosion of another canyon, our sweat carving the earth. From Michelle T. Clinton, Sesshu Foster, Naomi Quinonez, editors “Invocation LA.: Urban Multicultural Poetry” (West End Press, Box 27334, Albuquerque, N.M. 87125: $8.95, paper; 129 pp.). Henry J. Morro is an associate editor of Blue Window, a poetry magazine. 1989 West End Press. Reprinted by permission.