You define it.
Words trespassing your being,
like a knife-thrower
missing his target.
But only with rage. with that feeling
of space. Betrayed.
Time to run the circus.

Save the fiddle.
horse and carriage dragging a point. in a circle.
about a weeping statue.
protesting against wayward fancy-
and the gift, a mask that resembles truth,
though it cannot save you.
You deny it.

It was a Tuesday when I spoke of love,
That at first I did not care to trust,
For once I had been left for dead. in the Carnival.
Then there was chance. and a blissful recess.

But time had marked another Tuesday,
When I heard only the quiet of resignation,
That you might not have meant to tell.
Over hushed signs only the deaf could gather.

Still I return to the haunts of misery,
Of dissent. Of resentment. And of frailty-
As a mother bites her lip in pain
When her baby suckles blood, not milk.

I cannot say that I love
the shimmer of your smile,
the softness of your hair,
the careless little feet,
and your hands, the way one swings
while the other, swishing
against your side, wrinkling
your steam-pressed shirt.
If only I could dare to say,
stop. give me a kiss.

For if but one word slips to hint
the slightest of my affection,
I will find a wild canary
folding its wings.
What immutable void
lay deep in my breast!
Remote.
In a flutter.
All the love in the gutter.
And for what, only one kiss.

(para sa yo)

I have trouble
Sleeping in my room
Knowing it is soon.
Oh what trouble
Dogging and loving. Once
At a time. Then she finally shuns
The day. Call it a vision
Only to fool. I
Or the eye that saw the lie
In the rubble of isolation.
Cry. Only when Im gone.
Walk away. leave me undone.

I strum a note. A key that no door will take
For there is no one to let in, no one to know
About the terminal decay that writes music.
Every line a dispossession of the self that sings.

So I sing along the calm of this door-less room
Its walls almost crumbling into a pit of rocks-
Some sharp as knives, some blunt as other knives.
My voice cringed like a dew dropping

Onto a leaf with worm-bored holes,
Creating a harmony of muted confessions.

This is the hour, hands ticking the other way.
Then there was the man, atop the carillon tower
To signal the end of day
For mourners that flock the grave
With a headstone that bears my name.
Their faces remind me of defiance
Falling behind an instant of pure delight—
Obscuring the senses, numb as red water.
But they still bring flowers
And news of what could be
Had I ended it. An endless story
Of forbearance. Three years ago.

by Hussein

Look to the stars and search for the answer
Divine spewing of infinite enclaves
Amidst the deafening silence of black seas
All at peace with the beating of your heart

Look beneath a rock and search for the answer
Mighty creatures in constant battle with a universe
Far greater, far detached from the simple truth
That you exist but not to them

Look in his eyes and search for the answer
The ball of light makes him sweat
Drops of life only water can redeem
Not your love nor his, not you

Look in the mirror and search for the answer
A woman staring back, glancing, laughing
A familiar face of a mother to a child
Enfolded in answers one sees but knows not

by Hussein

Hugging the arc of a hipbone, his passed-down pants
Hung precariously low, both tips unable to touch
To make one loop around a gaunt exterior.
Bending, kneeling, kissing earth, hidden under mats,
Woven by virgins who could not bear children- five times over-
Were what made the day of a sinless boy.

A true angel he was but not for a day,
For he laid and he laid without giving much thought
To the consequences of a doubt, of ambition
That played games only rabid dogs played.
Aha…
His hands slid down the weathered fabric,
Feeling a thing that his pockets did not have,
A coin that seduced him.

---written and translated from Spanish by Hussein

Scrawny as a leper
whose head had fallen.
A name. A babel
of some blind cuckoos’ cry.

A battlefield of children,
where words were honed
like an ax to the back.
Another dead 10 y.o.

I stood up. A hermit
from my cave- a chair.
Space I barricaded
with closed ears and a toy.

Ugly as an old cup
that no hands shall seize,
except my little ones.
A thirst for bliss to quench.

---escrito por Hussein

Flaco con lepra
que había caído la cabeza.
Un nombre. Una disonancia
del grito de algun cuco oculto.

Un campo de batalla de niños,
en donde las palabras se afilan
como un hacha a la espalda.
Otro niño de diez años muerto.

Estado parado - Un ermitaño
de una cueva - una silla.
Mi espacio que cerqué
con oídos cerrados y un juguete.

Fea como vieja taza
que ningunas manos agarrarán,
excepto mis manos pequeńas.
Una sed de alegría a apagar.

by Hussein

The hands of a leaf-shaped clock raced
Like caterpillars on their tips, crawling about,
Round the numbers that looked like spears-
A falling apple clockwise,
A pilgrim otherwise.
And then, a lullaby began to play.

But still, outside, the moon was kind-
Borrowing light from a distant star,
To light the plaza whose guests appeared,
Sporadic as an itch on the back.
Fingernails clawing, hives reeking;
Someone lend them a wooden hand.

Again, the motor rumbled, stirring the night,
Engines scolding the nightmares that lurked,
In alleys between two houses, of one god,
Where smuggled tuktuks turned into bread
On the dining tables of guileless fathers-
Who never slept past the lull of dawn.

-Hussein

There is a time, it looks so gentle,
A secret so vast, crossing miles
Of whispered oblivion. In truth,
There never was.

As a child, I never found
Answers that a child always finds.

Not fewer than the careless lines
On the palm of my hand, have I
Tried to outgrow this naïve mind-
Pages I planted with bookmarks
So thin they were no longer there.

And thus I stepped into a puddle of certainties,
Feeling my heart throb inside a mass of meteorite
Orbiting the universe, beyond what light permits
For my searching eyes, to find the end of time.

-Hussein

I cannot survive the Kyoto winter. Not one more.
The familiar sound of herons, flapping their wings,
Wet from the splashing of children taking nosy distances-
Vanished.
Fled they all have to their moist nests.

And has the cold harvested the promise
From the little plants, that bore no fruits
Nor smelled like heaven? They chose to endure
The religious visits I paid
To the river that ignored me.

Could I be damned for throwing stones at the river
That assumed a blessed immortality?
Circles rippled away and back
As cold water crawled up my socked feet
To my spindly legs, leaving a blistered trail,
But not the pain I anticipated.

-Hussein

Edna, why is it you weep
Over hollow graves so deep?
Time, like scars of the heart,
Has left, no trail; do not part.
Idle slippers, under the street light
At midnight, is the most woeful sight.
Passing sorrow, a fading spell,
Fresh crown-wounds shall swell.
Foregone memories, lost in the cold,
Child, confused, her story untold;
What horror seen, the windless night-so bestial,
Almost afraid of happiness adrift-so celestial.
Oh, fret not, my hylic Madonna,
Weep, for I am here, my Edna.

-Hussein

The blades of grass
cut the bareness of my feet,
as my weight sought the voice
of mother earth pulling
my ebbing thoughts to its
center, where cold fire
slept and condoned
the devilry of my fathers
who fought and spilled blood
on this barren ground,
waiting to devour flesh
ruined by its own soul.