Tarlton Law Library
Jamail Center for Legal Research

Friends

We carry our problems
bundled up in a red sack
for the world to see
and throw them heavily over
our reluctant shoulders.
Our minds go out
over the rocky fields
carefully turning over
every cumbersome stone,
gathering the most dense,
jagged and irregular pieces
which our bodies,
in their wisdom,
are hesitant to bear.

The blind miser in the field,
accustomed to his hoarding ways,
cannot distinguish gold from lead
and furiously gathers gray weight
until he wears his tangled back
as his proud badge of honor,
thinking he is carrying treasures
instead of dark, confusing heaps
cast off by wise travelers ahead.

We bring sacks and sacks
into our peaceful houses
until there is no room to sleep,
no place to relax with our lovers;
 but we are aimlessly content
because the edges of the world
would curl up into earthquakes
if not for the problematic bundles
holding everything down in place.

So whisper me your secrets
and I will whisper you mine,
then we will weave them into webs
worthy of catching moon rays
and winds of a mystical sea.

Instead of a gray world in our sacks
we will carry clouds and dreams
and a few polished stones
as an anchor of memory.
We will ourselves be carried
by gentle waves of light
touching the wispy web sails
of our nimble little boat,
guided by a vague coastline
and a phantom compass
with markings we cannot yet name.

Death And Life

They say that when death comes,
those whom you have loved
gently hold your hand and
life passes before your eyes.

I say that when you came to me,
all of those whom I have loved
came together in your eyes and
life laid itself out before me.

We Had More To Say

We each had more to say.
Somewhere along the way
our words gave way to silence.
Out of nowhere--or everywhere--
in a story, in a sentence,
a suggestion of something greater.

An artist sketches the landscape
but the confluence of lines
hints at a presence
beyond the canvas,
an image as vague as mist,
a likeness without a name.

After the snow falls
it melts and comes down
from its high mountain perch,
 trying to sing a new song
that it has not yet composed:
a spring, a river, ocean waves.

After the great storm,
the clouds stumble
over one another
trying to rearrange themselves
into a semblance of snowy mountains
or a foggy coastline.

The intimate silence seemed to linger
but it only stayed for an instant
filled with longing and hope.
The quiet elicited more
than our elusive words:
repose caressed by joy.

View From Joy

The swirling mists,
the highest clouds,
carry devout water
kissed by bitter salt
in the deep darkness
of the stormy sea.

Weary pilgrims
silently cross
wandering canyons
and walk up to the church
at the top of the cliff
only to find
the height of their joy
measured by
the depth of their longing.

                           Montserrat
                    Cataluñia, Spain

How Do I Say Good Bye?

How do I say good bye
to you whom I have known
for a time so sweet?
Budded flowers at dawn opened
at the mere thought of you,
sending ecstasy into hives of bees.

Before you came to me
I saw only the gray in clouds
on the lonely expanse of days,
and on restrained nights,
only the solitude in moonlight.
 
Then, you brought me grace
as the dawn drapes light over mountains,
as the horizon brings depth to the day,
as the stars bring wonder to the night.

But in an instant you have gone;
a part of my soul has been cut away.
With what unworthy words
can I send you my blessings?
With what unfinished song
can I sing you my gratitude?

I remember our last embrace.
Now I embrace loneliness
and my memories of you,
my only companions now.

Your arms have become sorrow and despair
which embrace me with an intimacy
I have not known and do not beckon.

My tears will flow each day
sending sweetness and salt
to the solitary sea.

Each day I will ask how I can live
without the sweet melody of your voice
or the kind light flowing from your eyes.

As the mournful dusk approaches I will ask
how I can face the deep blackness of the night
without the hope of ever seeing you again.

                                          September 11, 2001

Raymond Zachary Ortiz was born in 1953 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He received his B.A. in English from the University of Notre Dame and his J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley. After clerking for the New Mexico Supreme Court, he joined a local firm, in which he became a partner. Ortiz continues to practice law with the Santa Fe firm of Roth, VanAmberg, Rogers, Ortiz, Fairbanks & Yepa, LLP. His practice is now in the areas of real estate, commercial law, real property, family law and Indian law. His poetry and stories have been published in the Southwestern U.S. and in Great Britain. He resides in Santa Fe with his family.
“Death And Life” previously appeared in a New Mexico publication, Man Alive!