Cienfuegos

Abuela calls me hot tempered,
while also referring to me
as a man of 100 fires.

Abuela calls me Camilo,
anytime I let my beard grow
out, my hair grow wild.
Camilo Cienfuegos,
the champion of the people, killed.

US says Cuba
Cuba says US
But he’s dead, memorialized
saying Vas bien, Fidel,
which you can’t help but wonder
about the insincerity, insecurity
of having to tell yourself that,
in public for eternity,
in the police state you built.

Abuela always calls me Camilo
when my hair grows out,
as if she’s worried that
untethered,
I’ll become like him;
used, killed, by someone trying
to get away with using, killing,
solely for themself.
As if I were too precious to
have that happen to me,
even if Camilo was clearly too precious,
for us.

Camilo, the hero from the campo,
not the prestigious school boy
married into the other dictator’s family,
who inherited that claim that all dictators have
of another’s home.
Camilo, the one who actually knows what
an empty stomach grumbles.

Abuela always calls me Camilo, who Abuelo drove
side by side with in celebration,
Havana taken over by campesinos y colegios
y congresos, and for a moment, not by anything else.
When he gets excited that I travel, he’s happy I’ve seen
the world. But he has apprehension of what comes next
of me using what I saw, to try to make the world better.
Tonto Útil. He’s afraid of seeing me drive side by side
with him, celebrating, only to never be seen again.

Vas Bien, my father remembers that differently.
How Camilo was talking and how he asked
that as a question to Fidel. Vas bien, Fidel?
Is it ok that I keep going? Am I doing right
by our people, our island, our home,
our vision for a free and better Cuba?

Castro y Che
knew how to talk to the US press,
Camilo talked for the people,
for us.

Vas Bien, Fidel?
Sure, for me, but maybe not
for us.
Abuela calls me hot tempered,
while also referring to me
as a man of 100 fires.

For Abuelo, Abuela, Pops and Moms
all worried about me disappearing,
to flame out like 100 fires at once.
But I am not afraid of being the one,
destined to disappear.
But I am afraid of being the one,
cursed to stay on the road, alone,
wondering where my friends,
my family, my youth,
my loves, my dreams
of finding
home, went.

For nothing is as cold as the ashes
from 100 fires that have been
extinguished, quickly, then slowly,
for eternity,
for us.