In Cuenca

 We walk under steel wool

            tarantula thorax;

dripping fangs looking to swallow us whole.

Spider web threads

 

            proud necklace

                        luring in flies.

 

Your yellow sundress             dances

in the primal yawn

            surfing

down the sapphire slopes

rising   North   South   East  West

trapping us in this stew.

Amber eyes glare,

           

jackals cackling among their crew,

waiting around

 

            just to wait

            more.

 

Here we eat beans.

Here we eat bananas.

Here we eat flying stones, crumbling Church, volcanic ash.

Teardrops trickle down rooftops

           

flowing beneath the floating filth

            filling the cracks of antique

façades

            faded by the flashing of khaki clad expats –

the income pays for the trolley,

buries ponchos and Panama hats

beneath the sports bars the museums.

The rubble rolls under out feet.

 

If we jumped, our heads

would hit the ceiling,

            that grey, marble tombstone,

the only thing stopping us from flying away.

***
(Cuenca, Ecuador -- November, 2020)

This poem is similar in style to "Behind the Cilantro." I love the abundance of imagery and the use of metaphors here. It's important to note that in this poem, "we" refers to my wife and myself during our years living in the beautiful city of Cuenca. This isn't "we" as in "we the people of Cuenca" making me their de facto mouthpiece. That's not what I wanted at all here.