The Wrestlers (Caramelo And Guapo Gringo) Though I was rash, run-of-the-mill— A tagalong athlete at best, How is it, after all these years, We’re still punning and wrestling? We never banter about this, The bald-as-a-sumo fact you insisted I drop “Fancy-pants” French and straightaway “enlist”— That’s exactly the verb you used!— In “handier” First-Year Spanish, And then recruited me For the mostly belittled wrestling team; I suppose, for your part, even then, Mat-work was akin To outright philosophy, a pulsing physical form Of fathomless meditation— I confess it tickles me you’ve settled In “Guadalajara, Guadalajara,” The vaunted birthplace of our tiny, At times fortissimo Spanish teacher, The far-sighted woman who instilled in us An endless love for totemic García Lorca, The magus García Marquez, And blind, encyclopedic Borges— On Señora Leticia’s engaging High school senior Spanish Club trek To gargantuan Mexico City, I fell in love with Montezuma’s Godzilla-and-Mothara-sized metropolis, But lamented my gadabout paseos, Without fail, blackened my saved-for deck shoes— In “onerous” high school, As we once derided it, As disapproving sophomores, You felt demi-cursed by your German And Scandinavian good looks, And instead of duly squiring Volume 8 No 1 - Page 33
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