Richard Blanco

Imaginary My|grations
Dallas Museum of Art, April 2020

Though I can’t hold or comfort the hands

that once held these urns with their sons
or mothers as ashes. Nor behold the love
in the eyes of the eyes that once beheld
these vases abloom with roses. Though
I can’t drink the cascade of water or wine,
never poured for me from the mouths of
these pitchers. Nor kiss the lips that kissed
these teacups, only savor the emptiness
of these empty plates and hollow bowls
with swirls of glazed flowers gazing back
at me now. Though I can’t chart the dreams
once dreamed underneath the geometry
of these blankets. Nor caress the shoulders
that donned these silk robes like butterflies’
wings fleeting into the sun. Though I can’t
alight myself to some other time. Nor trace
the footprints of lives erased from these rugs.
Though I can’t wear these tattered sandals,
or see the souls who wore down these soles
on their journeys, I can still imagine them
as I imagine myself like them someday
having to cross continents to dodge dying
in the crossfire of revolution, board a ship
to save my genes from genocide, or thrash
through raging whitewater to calm my ache
of famine in a land of plenty and promise.
Imagine what I’d take, not just to keep me alive
but to keep my life, a life. My salt, my spices
to taste who it was I am, a handful of seeds
to plant my favorite fruit, take root, claim
some new earth. My dead father’s watch
still ticking with his life. My favorite coffee
mug to watch my ghost rise in its steam. Imagine
what I don’t know I’ll need as much as I will.
My journal bookmarked by a petal between
the last scribble of who I was and blank pages
of who I’ll be. The front doorknob I’ll never
turn again, a photo album my eyes will turn
to greet lost faces. Imagine what only
my mind could pack. My windchimes’ giggles,
train whistles, a neighborhood dog’s yowls,
 Richard Blanco

the purr of nightwinds through my garden.

A breath of the winds I breathed, the dust
of my footsteps that might’ve blanketed
my bones’ sleep. The altar of mountains
my eyes will never praise again, memories
of clouds I told my secrets to. Imagine how
I’d scatter them into a new sky, transform
the beauty of loss and loss of beauty into
the art of a new life. The sweet arias of rain
recomposed over a new rooftop, the stars
I’d redraw into the constellation that guided
me to my new elsewhere. Imagine the moon
in the ear of some new window whispering
the poems I’d write to render myself at home
again, in a new house of words that someday,
someone might read and imagine the story
of their migration, in my own my|gration.