Patrick Kurth: "Joseph Garcia"

Joseph Garcia
***
joseph garcia
awaiting his execution in a texan penitentiary
sleeps often and dreams always
 
he awakes into the nightmare of the prison's interior
its schedule
its cast
its cement abuses and sterile steels
 
in his dreaming
he envisages some other day
his tattooed palm prone
beside a birthday cake
a twist of opaque smoke
whispers from a centenary candle
pudgy fingers fondle
wearies stubbled in tortoise leather
 
perhaps joseph wakes festooned with family joys
live with the chevy wind blown over i-10
or at ease in the caulk-mute privacy of the shower
 
perhaps joseph elicits the nightmare's ellipse
only in the madness of sleep
 
mr. garcia, like joseph,
foretells, visions simmeringm
the crows' devouring a bread
he hangs in the balance
and delivers us all
from the machine we have wrought

Patrick Kurth writes mostly from the desk in his Brooklyn bedroom. While he took up verse without training or expectation, aiming mainly to make a record of his memories, he has come to find his work with words enriching. His first publication appeared last year, in volume 39, issue 02 of Watershed Review. You can usually find him making poor sketches of the Met's Rodin sculptures or cycling over some city bridge.