Aubergine

From beyond the barbed wire fence property line
I watched the workers in the eggplant field
The Mexican czars of the North with worn fingertips
And prepaid phone cards. Hopelessness is a lung
Condition suffered from spending hours in a phone booth
Just off of Highway One. The eggplants are purple
But that purple seems to have nothing of O’Hara’s evening skies,
Purple and becoming more so. These men are not colorblind
Like the poet. The sky is blue during the day and only darker blue
As their shifts come to a close. Azul is azul and it has nothing
To do with purple like a drag queen and an immigrant
United by nothing but their nothing in commonness.
From between the rusted wires,
They handle the amassed Faberge delicately as a surrealist
Before puberty, cynicism, and vampirism. These aren’t even their orders
But they fear for a crack, the inside a geode of all thirst quenching sin
And wonderfulness. In Pescadero, there is a taqueria in a gas station
And in it, I sat amongst the dead czars of the Pacific
And they spoke about alcohol and sea breeze and
Girls just old enough to fuck and the best SPF for a California summer
Between rows of an old person’s favorite dish. They eat them
In the years before they die because they love what’s inside
Like forgotten lust and beach sand in welcome mats.
Tonight, I will drink red wine just this once
And we will break eggplant together at the table
Of the Lord and yes it will be good before the morning dew
Evaporates into the day’s haze and life continues as always.