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      July 12, 2024DishesRoberto Christiano

      “You can do what you want. Write a ghazal or do the dishes.”
      I’m in Zoom, a poetry class, and I know, there really are dishes
      in my sink accumulating guilt and luring the reckless red ants,
      but I am thinking of Uvalde, of all the kitchens with one less dish
      to wash tonight. I am thinking of my great niece and nephew,
      aged nine and ten, who toss each other the warm dry dishes
      straight out of the dishwasher. I am thinking of those bright dishes,
      bought from across the border, on the governor’s dark pine table,
      each one a swirl of blue and red. I am thinking hard about all the thoughts
      and prayers, and every my heart goes out, and every platitude dished out.
      I am thinking of a shy little girl in her white communion dress.
      On the table behind her, Mother has set a mass of churros in a dish.
      I am thinking of the antique, porcelain, Bavarian dishes my mother gave me.
      Nobody cares about them anymore. Roberto, you can put away the dishes.

      from #84 – The Ghazal

      Roberto Christiano

      “The ghazal, like the villanelle and the pantoum, has its roots in song. This appeals to my musical past. My father and brother were both musicians—Father played Portuguese and Italian folk music on the accordion and my brother was a rock guitarist. I played the piano and was a church pianist for a while. The repeating end words of the ghazal couplets remind me of the rounds of my childhood, the songs I sang in school, the quick refrains, the catchy and playful rhymes.”

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