filed under: memoir poems

Body Protectors

She liked to keep her angels close.
Gold, Silver tiny ones, little naked babies
with wings
Working as body protectors
because family and god had let her down,
weren’t strong enough
for the magic she needed
“god grant me the serenity”
but none came, and she waited

Those store bought saints could be moved
from one jacket to the next
or pinned on a monito
And sent off to Berkeley
traveling comfort and protection
when her babies began to leave for college.

Later handed down
from one sister to the next
in her old pink and gold bathroom
on a night the littlest one
couldn’t believe she was dead
didn’t want to
because she wasn’t there to do the angel work,
the love they thought all little kids were born into,
the kind they knew they couldn’t live without

They do, somehow
Not waiting for any grants from someone’s god
But from sudden necessity to live
With the strength passed down from one angel to the next.

* to remember my Nana

Under the Big Pink Tree

I used it to comfort me when I had to
go back
to where no one else knew
that it was never going to be
good again-
Forced to go on
functioning, achieving.
When I cried at anything that signaled
the loss of things,
A birthday cake with two numbered candles,
A pot of soup,
A Friday night,
A two hour car ride
A foggy morning with a hint of sun,

A glow of the red lamp
warming through their window
at our house
right under the big pink tree.

*to remember losing them

Huevos Rancheros

Our bodies are full of 

home cooked breakfasts

LA traffic 

and each other.

Of course, because I can just look at you 

and I'm as full as I've ever been,

flowing

and cooling off in words, and smooth brown skin.

Untitled

The afternoon sun 

of walking home together on the black crumbled street

warms up my small hands into weak fists.

I said,

If I had green grass under my feet.

and flowers to smell,

I wouldn't grow so tense,

so fast.

He covered my eyes for a moment

 and gave me a garden.

* to remember our love