By Ishmael von Heidrick-Barnes

My Uncle’s Cigar

Cigar smoke
blows my Uncle’s Cessna
over the Andes
home
where he strikes a match
lights another Habana

Hand rolled tobacco leaves
crackling
into an amiable glow:

Incense
granting my childhood prayer for peace
with three months of Mexican music
blasting from car radio

Driving up Interstate 5
to Torrey Pines
the beach to ourselves

Suntan lotion
anointing bodies
my uncle laughing
waves larger than ocean

Silver dollar handshakes
stories of my father’s car
conveniently breaking down
in front of my mother’s family home

Daily mass
cloudy talk of Bolivian drug lords
offering my uncle (a Catholic priest)
suitcases of cash
to smuggle cocaine across borders
the rosary supplemented
with a .38 caliber revolver
packed under his pillow

I might not have arisen
from an early death
where it not for his modest humility
translucent letters
hand typed on another continent
the 50 bucks he airmailed
for every A on report cards

A thin line
his love
casting words
into my stained glass windows
when I left his beloved mother Church

I excommunicated him
for judging
my break from sacred belief
to experience

Now
years after his descent into
aplastic anemia and death
I regret the ashes
I left on his forehead
and I light a cigar
the way elderly women light votive candles in echoes of churches

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Ishmael von Heidrick-Barnes

Ishmael von Heidrick-Barnes was born and raised in San Diego, California. He attended Herbert Hoover High School and went on to study Religion and Theology at the University of San Diego. His book Intimate Geography, published by Ragged Sky Press, won the 2012 San Diego Book Award for Poetry. Ish, as he is known, has also written lyrics for German musicians Andrea Hörkens and Thomas Roderburg (Tender Art).

Latest posts by Ishmael von Heidrick-Barnes (see all)

• Word’s Out | Geo-Poetic Spaces - December 14, 2018
• Political Love Affair | Geo-Poetic Spaces - December 7, 2018
• Deer Tracks | Geo-Poetic Spaces - November 30, 2018