Maricopa Indian Graveyard
Here I am where I said I would be:
surrounded by ghosts of young war
veterans. Tattered flags, more desolate
than flags that survived the worst battles,
wave goodbye to you.I sense your return in the plastic flowers
pierced into styrofoam crosses,
in the tin plates on which names are
no longer legible.Dates of birth and death become
no more than numbers spinning on the mill
of an angel chime.My dreams of you lie
in the empty flower vases
that once held real flowers.I wait here in the shadow of the Estrellas--
mountains insisting they are stars.
Copyright © Ramón E. Martinez, 1999. All Rights Reserved.