The Last Man

written by


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for Vivian Schatz
Here, in our familiar streets, the day 
is brisk with winter’s business.
The reassuring rows of brick façades, 
litter baskets overflowing
with the harvest of the streets
and, when the light turns, the people 
move in unison, the cars miraculously 
slide to a stop, no one is killed, 
the streets, for some reason, do not 
show the blood that is pouring 
like a tide, on other shores.

 Martinez, the last peasant left alive 
 in his village, refuses to run, hopes 
 that God, El Salvador,
 will let him get the harvest in.
 “Can a fish live out of water?” he says 
 for why he stays, and weeds
 another row, ignoring the fins 
 of sharks that push up
 through the furrows.

Here, it is said, we live
in the belly of the beast. Ahab sits
forever at the helm, his skin
white wax, an effigy. The whale carries 
him, lashed to its side by the ropes
from his own harpoon. His eyes
are dead. His ivory leg
juts from the flank of Leviathan
like a useless tooth.

 One more time, the distant sail appears, 
 a cloud forms, an old icon for mercy 
 turned up in a dusty corner
 of the sky, preparing rain
 for the parched land, Rachel
 weeping for her children. “Can a fish 
 live out of water?” he asks
 and the rain answers, in Spanish, 
 manitas de plata
 little hands of silver on his brow.

© Hugo Williams