A fractured moonlight
lands lightly
across the east of a city,
across its hills,
bustling streets
and graffiti shrines.
The night surrenders to its echoes.
Dogs bark across chain-link terraces
traveling with the gravelly rip of tires
spinning on thick black asphalt--
its bodice of freeways.
Look closely,
what exists is a poetry and laughter
as inseparable
as Tezcatlipoca's or Shakespeare's.
A hand scribbles away
its urban calligraphy
on concrete paper,
another strums
an amplified mandoline--
its notes filling the desperation
hanging in the night.
East Los Angeles is hungry,
vibrant and ready.
Can you see it?
words
by Aida Salazar
