A Couple of Poems

I know it’s been a long time since I posted anything and for that I apologize. I signed a contract with my publisher, Wipf and Stock, for a new novel, a tale of spiritual warfare, in the style of Frank Peretti, that takes place during the Bosnian War. I’m hoping to publish by the end of the year. In the meantime, I’ve written a couple of poems while waiting to see my people at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York. I hope you enjoy them.

Metropolitan Detention Center

                                                    Brooklyn, New York 8/2/23

Below a cloudless, bottomless blue sky,

inside

the linoleum floor,

freshly mopped,

shines under fluorescent bulbs.

The guards are dark and angry today,

as they are most days,

with stern voices and nervous laughs.

There are too few

to cover the cost

and so men stay

locked down,

for no reason,

but,

there aren’t enough eyes to watch them

and the eyes that look do not see.

And so they stew in their mad gloom

and cogitate on their hate

of self,

the higher authorities, and more…

And they wait

to come out of their cells

and breathe, 

a little more freely,

and eat, and shower,

and play their games,

and go to court

and plea …

And I wait to see him,

his dark eyes

that can still see some small light of joy

breaking through

the cracks, 

to hug him,

heart to heart, 

to hear his hope

and despair,

to pray our way 

up and out,

to say goodbye again,

and again,

and again.                                           

                                    Ray Lopez

Metropolitan Detention Center Brooklyn, NY December 20, 2023

Surrounded by voices swirling 

In the visiting room,

the sound fills the space in my head.

The source, detainees,

mostly young black men,

attorneys,

mostly middle-aged white men,

propel the power,

the energy of noise,

like water rushing

over a falls.

The volume constant,

as intense conversations roll,

in dynamic flow,

male and female,

multiple voices, tone and tenor

in concert.

More detainees pour into the room,

filling the space,

voices rising,

merging into

one indecipherable tongue 

but for some laughter.

My mind is in a rowboat,

without oars,

on the edge

of the falls

spinning slowly

around

just sound.

But I won’t look up from this page,

not to be moved by the flesh of others,

just the voices

water rushing over the falls

as my eye settles this boat

on the edge 

looking over

water crashing below.                                             Ray Lopez