Black Beans and Ham Hocks
Sometimes, I feel like the ham hocks /
left in the pot of beans to soften.
Category: Poetry
3 Poems
“You aren’t Latina,” they say to the sapling, who could have /
thrived, stretched into the sky, rooted in the cleaving of scarred parts. /
Infra-realisticamente
Guadalquivir /
se llama el río /
donde un antepasado /
(“con dudas”) se persignó /
por última vez //
descabezado. /
La casa & Post-Caliban Blues
this is not Ithaca /
this is Borikén /
and the house dwells beyond façade /
To Otto René Castillo
Oye, Otto. /
Siguen unos allí, sin poder hablar. /
They can’t talk. /
Skulls and bones. /
The Floor Is So Cold & Teocani and Alejandro
The floor is so cold /
she told her sobbing mother, /
my lips are blue. /
Drunk Tíos & I Used To Work at a Liquor Store
The first bitter taste of alcohol /
burns their throat /
but slides like honey /
they listen to some old Spanish songs that crack from muffled speakers /
of their old, beat-up Silverado in their driveway
3 Poems – Rla dizh / Xjaa / Lo nez Santa Mony
In my father’s eyes /
I see me. /
It is me who is him /
but we are not the same.
Ndumūi*
en bóveda del mundo parpadea la tarde, / una lágrima se vuelve viento / está la noche temblando / la tripa hace hambre, dicen los hijos
Por Inbox / Corona de Cristo
El dolor no cabía en mi corazón y las interrogantes no cabían en mi mente, llegó un momento en que mi cuerpo no soportó más y, literalmente, se hinchó: así conocí la preeclampsia.
3 Poems: Musrhí pa ipai / Sr’ma kia man / Ksar*
Mujer fuerte, como el tejido de tus canastas de olor a /
pino y palma, que su único fin es guardar las semillas /
que seguirán floreciendo, para que la gente pa ipai nunca /
termine.
Poems from “Radiance”*
I imagine him a heartbreaker, like I grew up to be, /
perhaps with dark eyes and tattoos and a nefarious /
persona. It is said he was Puerto Rican. […]
Zarzamora
Zarzamora continues to Commerce Street /
To Martin, to Poplar, /
To Culebra where one-legged lesbians ask for /
Money, drugs and sell their demos.
My American Dream
It was destiny, perhaps /
that pushed the mothers /
of the mothers of our mothers /
further south, to warmer lands
