Cesar Vallejo

Miguel

I'm sitting here on the old patio beside your absence. It is a black well. We'd be playing, now. . . I can hear Mama yell "Boys! Calmdown!" We'd laugh, and off I'd go to hide where you'd never look. . . under the stairs, in the hall, the attic. . . Then you'd do the same. Miguel, we were too good at that game. Everything would always end in tears. No one was laughing on that August night you went to hide away again, so late it was almost dawn. But now your brother's through with this hunting and hunting and never finding you. The shadows crowd him. Miguel, will you hurry and show yourself? Mama will only worry.