Manuel Sánchez. Our Demand

At the gangway, our demand was a straw pava.

We wore our demand jauntily cocked across our skull.

So what if rain poured inside our collar?

Our demand had a crown woven of twenty-five american dollars.

It jounced as we danced for our wives.

We affixed it to our head with rusty nails.

Our demand was a wedding mantilla drooping off our face

down to our clavicle;

it would have blurred our vision if not for the countless holes

made from years of stabbing it with a spanish comb.

The demand we wore to the point of abasement was a nun’s wimple.

To prove to our wives that we still grew beards, we made endless

adjustments,

even when we lay prostrate with our arms cruciform.

The demand we settled for was a five dollar tatter

the size of a neckerchief, and sweat ridden.

The wind snatched it, twisted it loose.

Some of us refused to step off the dock without knowing

where our demand had blown.

It was plastered across our eyes.