She sits, cigarette limp in her mouth, Thinking that the day has almost ended. And the stars she stares out at From the living room of the group home She remembers are other earths limping Half-free in the grips of other Dying suns. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- - Houston In Houston's summers the gods Use the clouds as urinals For three minutes daily. In Houston the Boat-People Come from planes. Inner-city--intermingled and alone Like its green Buffalo-Bayou Strewn only in the imaginations Of those who run along it briefly. A mile from the bayou The settled imagination of a Nine year-old Vietnamese girl Allows a mangled brown horse To elongate and flatten out To the reality of the rolled up carpet (All because of the rain). She feels the wetness now beginning To seep into her clothes; She raises herself; she sees the old Cuban Walking from the house with hands To the sky, as if to make the heavens appear a little longer In the manner that the downtown buildings, From Dallas Street on, by their Stories of windows draw down the sky's enormity from measurement Both extensive and inadequate; And she follows him. Apart And yet they both think about the Vietnamese Teenager with curlers in her hair Who yells "boo" behind doors That are entered; The Cambodian boy who To the view of the Montrose area Pours on the bare shrubs, And then strips and pours upon himself, The water from a hose, and that both animal and plant Glisten in the sun As if they have been greased; Falling into Houston's world of high buildings From the descending planes While hoping that the big world would Not overpower their memories; And the Cubans, in house #2 always yelling of "Miami." They believe that Cambodian refugees Always clean house #1, That Africans never clean themselves, and that Laotians often pour rice down the drains Causing the faucets of the house to stop-up; And that the welcome-center Manager Does not care to bring over a little clothing And a little food or take them on little trips To the Social Security Office or the doctor's office Past 5 p.m.-- But of different seconds in that minute, Different lengths, and various perceptions. She remembers the ugly man In Vietnam that ran from the police And then a scar around his eye Opened from the clubs and the blood Tried to escape him completely As the body attempted to pull itself From the street, and could not. He remembers thinking that the Cranium of an old man is always heavy On the neck, and that his Is becoming like this.