Manzanar Scorpions
my aunt and uncle arrive
a three-day drive from California
tomato, pepper, strawberry plants
await a new home in Westerville
(that's in Ohio)
digging in moist springtime soil
their roots reunite with the earth's
earthworms extracted entertaining
eight-year-old Justin who laughs
we explore with a magnifying lens
turning over rocks to discover other
crawlers, pill bugs, centipedes --
uncle Hitoshi sits at the table
relaxing with a cold can of beer
and stories emerge from a mind
full of memories
my uncle's family
was one of the first
where ten thousand once lived
half a century ago, called Manzanar
among mountains of the eastern Sierras
barren dry dusty desert
before the people came --
"scorpions were 12 inches long"
no one believed them
they sent photographs
no one believed them
they sent the scorpions
to the Smithsonian Institution
-- the largest ever found
"and centipedes at Manzanar
were three inches!"
my uncle holds his fingers apart
with a pause for added drama --
"not three inches long, I tell you
three inches wide!"
that night I dreamed of walking
and walking to discover it closed
returning to desert rocks to find
ghostly centipedes and scorpions
crawling magnified in the moonlight
-- their poison still stings
like barbed-wire