One Last Poem For Richard by Sandra Cisneros

December 24th and we’re through again.
This time for good I know because I didn’t
throw you out — and anyway we waved.
No shoes. No angry doors.
We folded clothes and went
our separate ways.
You left behind that flannel shirt
of yours I liked but remembered to take
your toothbrush. Where are you tonight?

Richard, it’s Christmas Eve again
and old ghosts come back home.
I’m sitting by the Christmas tree
wondering where did we go wrong.

Okay, we didn’t work, and all
memories to tell you the truth aren’t good.
But sometimes there were good times.
Love was good. I loved your crooked sleep
beside me and never dreamed afraid.

There should be stars for great wars
like ours. There ought to be awards
and plenty of champagne for the survivors.

After all the years of degradations,
the several holidays of failure,
there should be something
to commemorate the pain.

Someday we’ll forget that great Brazil disaster.
Till then, Richard, I wish you well.
I wish you love affairs and plenty of hot water,
and women kinder than I treated you.
I forget the reason, but I loved you once,
remember?

Maybe in this season, drunk
and sentimental, I’m willing to admit
a part of me, crazed and kamikaze,
ripe for anarchy, loves still.

Johnny Cash - Pocahontas (Neil Young cover) Fan music video

Aurora borealis
The icy sky at night
Paddles cut the water
In a long and hurried flight
From the white man
To the fields of green
And the homeland
We've never seen

They killed us in our tepee
And they cut our women down
They might have left some babies
Cryin' on the ground
But the firesticks
And the wagons come
And the night falls
On the setting sun

They massacred the buffalo
Kitty corner from the bank
The taxis run across my feet
And my eyes have turned to blanks
In my little box
At the top of the stairs
With my indian rug
And a pipe to share.

I wish a was a trapper
I would give thousand pelts
To sleep with pocahontas
And find out how she felt
In the mornin'
On the fields of green
In the homeland
We've never seen.

And maybe marlon brando
Will be there by the fire
We'll sit and talk of hollywood
And the good things there for hire
Like the astrodome
And the first tepee
Marlon brando, pocahontas and me
Marlon brando, pocahontas and me
Pocahontas.