San Juan, PR, 13.3.25, Cementerio Santa María Magdalena de Pazzis

Grey clouds float low over the horizon, threaten rain.  

Waves roll in, violently chopped and dark blue.

Kites gyrate joyfully in the wind; a rebirth of childhood

Next to the graveyard by the cliff in old San Juan.

The flags in the graveyard, they flap too, a patch of motion where all else stands still.

Is it pride for their state or resistance that they fly?

Their motion full of fight for remembrance, for life.

Peacefully, their ancestors buried them on a cliff overlooking the ocean,

Weighed down by stone, lit up by flowers

life and death lying side by side.

Now the waves are rolling in, further faster, spurred on by storms.

The cliff edge is getting smaller because the sea wall doesn’t work.

What was assured as a safe resting place is now in peril.

The crosses and statuettes don’t provide protection from nature.