El Parque Central, Antigua Guatemala
two young girls in traje crying
their mother laughs and comforts them
and returns to work selling camisas
to tourists seeking some local color
the older homeless woman is still
on her feet, her thin dirty legs
poking out from the colorless shirt
that's covering her this cold morning
I don't know why she's been shouting
at the kids, but for a brief moment
she has the attention even of
the feral prowling shoe-shine boys
a friend tells me she'd overheard
the woman earlier that morning
repeating softly to herself:
the flowers are blue, yellow, red
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