Hustle
In a café house I met my God,
He wore grey hair, a top of the line coat,
meditated in jungles, surrounded by Mumbai,
a God with a rock glowing florescent
fruits and flowers on empty tables,
I met my God,
who held a serpent in a crawling leg of spiders reaching tied tongues,
all angry over deserved pedigree,
reading my mind in the Mexican desert,
as wild cacti grew over him,
I fought him,
the warrior retreated,
we passed the wine bottle, a chardonnay and he paid,
nine-ball hustler making money from the unsuspected,
he was a healer for a mafia man, who carried the name Joe,
and he took care not to forget when the gun sounded,
“Ha, you okay kid,”
swearing back at him, the cold pistol fell on his head,
I saw him, bend in fear outside the doorway at eighteen,
he checked my psychological state, but I knew his better, putting my hand over the
drawn face of a forgotten person,
I could not look at the image,
my eyes saw him,
I saw the hustler again, who swindled money from anyone,
corporate dollars for team building,
my God was my twin, melted in age on laden towels in bathroom hotels, I leaned in, I
heard him before he spoke,
and he said,
“I’d either love him or hate him,”
and I nearly hit me in the road,
I nearly flew over the rail, to meet who he told me was out there,
a sign flashed in front of me, Maya stopped the road blocks,
I ran to the sun in deep rains,
I told him of my lineage,
my hearing of all he knew,
he saw them around me, fifty strong men,
I was the taken, I was taken, given again,
and I heard him in the strange light in my eyes, saw a car door open,
neti neti,
I am neti -neti,
amor fati, I entered the tequila bottle left in the Mexican sun,
amor fati,
I twisted him into strings hanging
over our father's histories.
By Melinda Cochrane copyright 2013