A pelican dives into the bay.
Vendors hawk popsicles,
women, clay masks
from baskets on their heads.
Noon, they rest under palm trees,
umbrellas of the poor.
Overhead, a flock of gulls
flap their way north
returning to their first nesting place.
How can I find mine, father
embalmed in whiskey,
mother shrouded in a silver sheath.
Not in the sky, on land
or in the sea, they are the ache
that lives in me, no tin Milagro
a woman offers, can cure.
Back north, my daughter cares
for her ill husband.
Will he be with her next year?
It’s January 6 and the Three Kings
are following the star to bring gold,
myrrh and incense for the infant.
Soon shattered pinatas will release
their gifts. Mine, I am alive.
“Looking for a Cure” was originally published in Presence: A Journal of Catholic Poetry 2019.
Carole Stone has published five books of poetry, among them American Rhapsody (CavanKerry Press) and Traveling with the Dead (Backwaters Press). She is Distinguished Professor of literature, emerita, Montclair State University. Carole wrote this poem while in Zihuatanejo where she spends a month each winter. Mexicans celebrate January 6 rather than Christmas day. It is a joyous occasion with pinatas for the children to open and receive their gifts.