Darkness comes sooner in the skid row
This Christmas, this season of cardboard
Boxes for a regal manger, for a house.
Darkness comes sooner, darkness arrives.
On the streets on Hill, Main, the Grand,
On the busy boulevards that brag about
Diamonds in every carat and kind you want,
Darkness comes there sooner as well, sooner
As the evenings wear on more wearily
Afraid of thieves and fear, wary as well
Of this Christmas coming sooner in winter
Before the freezing fall is over, done,
Before the gems of gold gain their luster,
Capitalize on the sentiment of giving
More and having more and showing more
To mean love and respect and grandeur.
We hold the hand of time a bit, just a bit
In these places of worship for the capitalist,
He who has come to conquer the heart of love,
One defined according to how the dark days
Come to soon, sulk on the sullen streets,
Sad too like those shopping for sorrow on
Window sills and showcases: the dirt man,
He with with cardboard stacks on the corner;
His partner, a ladybag, her face
The color of bygone Christmasses
Without the accidents and decor,
Her countenance the absence of grief,
Or the forgetting of the clear days
In order to turn the hand of time,
Turn it backwards, one more hour late
Of hoping for more hyped happiness,
Delay a little more, one more time, more,
Once more, this Christmas coming too soon
Its ticking coming too fast, and the night
Comes, possess the last light in this chorus
Of crude lies: a truth for the rich,
Those who go home to the gated hills,
Sip their espresso close to the hearth,
Think of the contour of the dirt man,
Imagine the untold capacity of the lady bag
To desire the stones, the metals, the cache
Of possibilities, infinite as ever, ever
For a differing, deferring Christmas.
In the meantime, the dirt man spreads
His mat of cardboard, a minimalist covering
From the cold, an architecture of home
The ladybag completes with a cloth roof.
Aurelio S. Agcaoili
Nov. 25, 2004
Fullerton, CA, while attending a thanksgiving day
party of turkey and laughter
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