Jim LaVilla-Havelin

Five Poems

Rattle, Wail, Sing

Then the heavy door buzzes open

            clicks shut,

The big gate – louder buzzer clacks

            to let me in, snaps closed.

Chain link rattles, a pinging shiver of

            sound.

and whorls of concertina wire sit

            perched atop the chain link

            catching glints of large lights

            which bathe the space.

I am not here to give you voice -

            you have already.

Does the rattle of the chain link rise

            above the wail?

Do the whorls of concertina

            sing in the

            wind?

Ot is that you?

Resistance/Persistence Suite

I.                      The Others

                                    for Palmer Hall

we were no fraternity

of One A’s on our way

to the Boston Army Base

that April morning

I didn’t know the others –

but now I do –

names on Maya Lin’s scar

            of names

poets with cancers from

Agent Orange

men my age with PTSD

before they even called it that,

shell-shocked

they could have called my altruistic bluff

to see if it went anywhere beyond

saving my own skin

and offered to let the others go

if I went in their stead

could have messed with my head

the others went in mine

would I have let them let them go

and gone?

II.                                April 23, 2018

Fifty years ago today I threw my body

            into the cogs of the war machine.

                        If I told you I was staunch and fearless,

I would be lying.

            In Boston sunlight

                        marched back to the Resistance offices,

                                    Stanhope Street, behind the police station

Marched with black flags flying singing anarchist songs      -

            who knew the words?

Does anything grind to a halt?

            Does any one make a difference?

Fifty years ago today some men stepped forward

            I stepped back

                        and lived

Fear became quiet became nagging doubt became

            relief became guilt became pride

                        all ground to dust by

machineries that care not a whit

            for the people who created them

sleepless, sleepless machineries which live endless lives

            long after Neruda is gone

III.                   April 24, 1968

                        the next day, nothing had changed

                        the war still raged on

                        I looked over my shoulder

                        we were in the street

                        and oh, the certainties we shared

                        so braced us – we would never admit

                        we were afraid. we may even have

                        whistled, those of us who could whistle.

                        in the basement stock room of Brentanos

                        unpacked and read The Last Unicorn

                        one whole afternoon, absorbed in the

                        fantasy

                        liberal families from the suburbs

                        brought pot luck dinner to the basement

                        of the church for the resistors – our only

                        certain meal

                        I looked over my shoulder for years.

The Common Pond

                                                October 10, 2019

The public poem is an odd contraption.

                         The public poet is a beast.

                        When I was young I used to muse on Yevtushenko

                                    carried off the soccer field on the shoulders

                                    of adoring fans.

                        The rabbits in my poems are the rabbits I see out my window.

                        I do not pull them out of a hat.

                        Afterward, I’d think of Lorca and Neruda the cost of

                        words.

                        And even if there is no other fit medium, I know that

                                    seeing and saying and getting it right – is all.

                        They found the actual red wheelbarrow leaning against

                                    a New Jersey neighbor’s wall.

                        I’d watch Trino all in white, a poet saint, with his black beret

                        as he flapped us welcome to his realm – pointing at

                        parking spaces.

                        Not old and grey and full of sleep, but balanced on a scaffold

                                    of words, quizzical, and particular –

                        some words I will not put in poems, some names I will not utter –

                        this public poet wonders whether we can still

                        get it right

                        in words.

how right I get it really

                                    depends

                        the public poem is a boat, a boast, a bet

                        against the ear dulled by discourse in the realm

                        of banter, bicker, and berated.

                        I could not raise this barn alone, you know

                        this haven for words and wishes, wonders and

                        the winds of change. The ridgepole would, on my own,

                        come down on my head. It is a thing we do together,

                        believing in each other, trusting, knowing, even taking

                        the chance – expecting gifts, simple, free, and placed

                        in a needing soil, naturally..

                        what words we have we have only the loan of

                        they will go back to the common pond we row across

                        for others to sample, taste, create, and give back

                        in dry word times all of us unquenchable

                        we build the barn together

                        we build it for each other

                        and it  is enough.

Walt’s Apology

South of the city, most mornings I can hear, from beyond the roadrunners and the rabbits,

            from out past our great wall of nopal.

the sounds of trucks and cars, singing the road on their way to Laredo and beyond –

            Old Laredo Highway, trade route, gateway –

and many days the sound of morning birdsong and the rattle of live oak leaves in the breeze,

            holds that sound at bay.

And I hear the other Americas singing, the trucks and cars, the avocados and the families

            on the road from Laredo and beyond, to make new lives.

I hear the singing in the voices of people in stores speaking English and Spanish and some

            melodic mix of the two. Singing family, singing place, singing coming and going, and

            going and staying.

Wrong about the war, and too late to tell anyone, except in something as fragile as a poem.

In listening to the highway singing, the gente cantando, the birds catching on and matching

            rhythm for rhythm, and everyone ready to take my hand

if only, I too, sing.

The Articles of Extraction: A Call for Active Resistance

I’m thinking we’ll need

                        good heavy wire/fence cutters to open holes in the

                                    detention holding tanks.

                        a bunch of large, strong folks with implements to

                                    cut open locks or knock down doors,

                                    wearing bullet-proof vests  ( if they’re going

                                    to shoot us, they’ll have to go for our heads)

                                    and some of these strong folks should be ordained

                                    and with collars (is it harder for them to shoot

                                    nuns and priests?)

                        Spanish speakers to translate at every site

                        some people ready to get arrested if need be

                        thousands of people waiting outside the fences –

                                    a crowd to blend into

                        vans at each site to fill with people to take away to

                        safe houses set up in advance - sanctuaries, families,

                                    ready to take them in

                                    and no GPS, so no one can hack in

                        a single night

                        fearlessness, but not foolhardiness

                        a level of disgust with holding children and families,

                                    huddled masses, that makes doing this

                                    the only answer

                        a song to sing in the darkness that makes us,

                                    keeps us strong in the face of everything.

I’m thinking every day we wait is a life lost.

*“Rattle, Wail, Sing”  first appeared in  Prayers to the Sky (Gemini Ink, 2020) anthology of poetry by residents of the Cyndi Taylor Krier Juvenile Correctional Treatment Center, San Antonio, TX. “The Others” from “Resistance/Persistence Suite” first appeared in Intertwining, publication of the Art of Peace Festival, Tyler, TX. “The Common Pond” written for my acceptance of the City of San Antonio’s 2019 Award of Distinction in Literary Arts, first appeared Laureates for the Pueblo by the River, limited edition publication for session of AWP San Antonio 2020. “Walt’s Apology” originally appeared in Wayland XXIV, Chicago, 2019.

Jim LaVilla-Havelin is the author of five books of poetry, the most recent WEST, poems of a place (Wings Press, 2017) trains its eye and ear to the poet's move to the country after a lifetime of city life. LaVilla-Havelin is the Coordinator of National Poetry Month in San Antonio, TX, and the Poetry Editor for the San Antonio Express-News/Houston Chronicle. Teacher, community arts activist, and organizer, LaVilla-Havelin was a co-founder of Stone in Stream/Roca en el Rio - a collective of environmental activists, writers and visual artists.