Draft 3: Pantheon of Three

[alonso ramoran]

Pantheon of Three

n. kuya: (Philippines) an elder brother.

Through the open window, Today helps me
guide in golden glitter that
will transfigure what we build
into a castle, secret and enduring.

Piled bowls of milky water wash themselves
and the TV, after no longer
being watched, turns off. Kuya Yesterday
designs the frame, bringing up dumb ideas
that Today and I would sometimes go with.
If Today and I want to bring in guns, bears,
and owls, to defend our parapets and for
morale, that's what we'll do.

Sheets unfurl and swell, bright with a fall sun.
We tie their corners to the bunk bed railing,
to the legs of the coloring table,
with what stings our innocent confusion.
Feathers permeate and mingle with
coruscating flecks of rust.

What could we set the bunk bed's ladder
up against for our roof? We have our words
then decide on Kuya Yesterday's dresser
and drape the ladder and coloring table
over in a comforter. Evening light
reveals drifting dust and years

passing into boredom. Soon,
Kuya Yesterday and Today, you both
might live away,
together or apart—just
remember tomorrow, stupid.

Draft 2: Pantheon of Three

Through the open window, Today helps me
guide in golden glitter that
will transfigure what we build
into a castle, secret and primordial.

Piled bowls of milky water wash themselves
and the TV, after no longer
being watched, turns off. Kuya Yesterday
designs the frame, bringing up dumb ideas
that Today and I would sometimes go with.
If Today and I want to bring in guns, bears,
and owls, to defend our parapets and for
morale, that's what we'll do.

Sheets unfurl and swell, bright with a fall sun.
We tie their corners to the bunk bed railing,
to the legs of the coloring table,
with the consequences of our mistakes
of confusion. Feathers permeate and mingle
with coruscating flecks of rust.

What could we set the bunk bed's ladder
up against for our roof? We decide
on Kuya Yesterday's dresser
and drape the ladder and coloring table
over in a comforter. Evening light
reveals drifting dust and years

passing into boredom. Soon,
Kuya Yesterday and Today, you both
might live away,
together or apart—just
don't forget tomorrow.


Draft 1: Pantheon of Three

Midday's golden glitter seemed to bless 
our innocence with endless fun. 
We spent our lifetimes architecting
a fabulously funny fortress,
its foundation was
a dresser we had built about. Its frame- 
several coloring tables and a leaning ladder. 
 
Assigning what goes where 
or who does what, that if 
the moon and where its milky mists 
were to wet, was a shred contentious, 
then cows would cock-a-doodle  
at a wolf's standing madness. 
 
    Luckily, the placement of the parapets 
    are what we argued over, on where we'd set 
    pillows bricks and blanket walls.
 
It may have taken a lifetime or two, 
but when we came to a consensus 
we would work our whims 
to, where our little Pete, the Canary 
suggested in his little song, 
set the final piece atop 
what would become our own Cair Paravel;  
 
and just like that- our fingertips 
sent a surge of magic through the ordinary; 
and we asked that bird, in court, 
to be our fair-haired balladeer. 
Before he could reply, our parents 
saw the room a laundry heap 
 
    and had us clean the mess
    and strip the structure to its frame
    just because they were expecting guests. 
 
And the lifetimes spent so carelessly 
on everything but being gods 
caught up as we sluggishly 
arranged the room back to 
its fundamental husk. Glitter 
is now the dust of dusk,
fading through the stuffy air.
 
Horton left with all his friends 
in exchange for talk of weather over wine. 
And when we talk of weather over wine: 
it is then I bid us not forget 
fantastic things that have taken place 
when boredom silently became 
 
    a mawkish emptiness these days.