Marco Bravo


MARCO BRAVO is a Nicaraguan-American raised in Tucson, Arizona. He holds degrees from the University of Redlands and the University of Arizona. His poems have been featured in The Bilingual Review and Enfoque: Latinoamerica and he also has a chapbook called, Detras del Biombo. He currently teaches Spanish at Boys Town High School and Metropolitan Community College in Omaha, Nebraska.




WINGS

My country
Acts in the
Weirdest ways.

At times, a
Dragonfly in
Silk nylons trapped
In a plastic bag,
Waiting to be
Released.

But also, a
Switchblade with
Nets, catching us,
Las mariposas de
Mañana, echos of
Yesterday’s
Heart-beat.

Clipping our
Wings as we
Leave one home
For another.

I want to be the
Gamble. The Xochitl
Of paradise.

Instead, they call us
Cockroaches with
Wings.
Toilet beast, rattlesnakes
Plowing the land.

Tucked away,
Like an accordion,
I know I belong.

I know I’ll be
The red balloon
That flew
Away. 



OLD, BROKEN-DOWN RADIO


I shouldn’t keep listening to that
Song on that old, broken-down radio,
A Nacatamal lullaby,
In which they all return.
Plus, it’s just a song.

But
This song,
The song I can never sing right,
Because the words clog my throat
As if every emotion was rolled
Together in a ball of masa wanting
To explode like a loose bottle rocket.

Everyone, all of them, todos
They are all at fault for leaving
That old, broken-down radio.

And
The melody keeps me
Like a wild disease,
It keeps me,
Like my neighborhood street
with those clumsy mailboxes, filled
With lost love letters,
and my heart
Hangs like a piñata in the
Back porch of this song.

Then at times I hear it and it’s  
Just like when there’s fire
In that cave or when I’m
Standing on that bridge that
Glows like a fever, and my soul
Bounces like a red little ball thrown down an
empty arroyo.

That song on that old, broken- down radio,
It was the last one, the old one, the one that brings
Me back. The language I never planned;
The one I’ll never forget.



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