The rusty mariachi toppled over and on top
Of the melting pile of former snowman.
These things happen. Imagine it was a piece
Of random metal falling over in melting snow.
There. That would be inhuman. But it wasn’t.
In our world it was a confection of meanings
Intersecting with the actual, a kitschy statue,
A lawn ornament of a mustachioed hombre
Playing an iron guitar, that fell into the slush
That had been a man with a cloth flat cap
And a carrot of a nose. And so forth.
One mariachi, one snowman are two men.
This is old song. Doesn’t matter which
Language, which tradition, which faith
Defines you. You see a figure of a man
Made out of scrap, you’re bound to think
Of something. Man. Musician. Metal tools.
You’re symbolic. You can’t help it. You see
A watch on a heath, you think a person
Dropped it. You might even think a person
Made it, when you’d know, if you thought
About it, that no one being invented or forged
Such a complicated thing. No one being
Made the mariachi. And the daughter
Who made the snow man worked within
A design tradition predating and informing her.
Are you reading this? Then this, poor thing,
Even this, is more you than you ever were.
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