Just Call Me Lori
Harry Penders
September 2000
Slivers of Andean moonlight,
It reads my fading faith.
Friends gone in the night,
Time irrelevant to these barren slopes.
We count the seasons instead,
Carvings by my head, seem alive but dead;
Swallows at the bars cry for bread.
Yes, we curse scream and pace,
Fighting, for the space between us.
Here in nine by nines, innocence gone;
Lost in this 'Land of the Quechua.'
Down frozen alleys I hear the horror,
Repeating history - most without guilt;
Concrete pillows lie in wait.
Youth fades...from my swollen eyes,
I wake to the sweat of cold restraint.
He haunts my nights, and kills my days,
See him soulless, 'The Hooded One.'
Face of a Lima Court, presidente' corrupt;
He dons me evil; but call me Lori instead.