The Poet X(24)
Tied down by no one. Fluttering
and waving in the wind. Flying. Flying. Gone.
Mami Says,
“There be no clean in men’s hands.
Even when the dirt has been scrubbed from beneath nails, when the soap scent
from them suspends in the air—there be sins there.
Their washed hands know how to make a dishrag of your spine, wring your neck.
Don’t look for pristine handling when men use your tears for Pine-Sol;
they’ll mop the floor with your pride.
There be no clean there, girl.
Their fingers were made to scratch dirt, to find it in the best of things.
Make your heart a Brillo pad, brittle and steel—don’t be no damn sponge.
Their fingers don’t know to squeeze nicely.
Nightly, if you imagine men’s kisses, soft touches, a caress, remember Adam was made from clay that stains the hand, remember that Eve was easily tempted.”
Repetition
Mami’s hard hands
make me dizzy and nauseous.
Mami prays and prays
while my knees bite into grains of rice.
Mami repeats herself
while her statue of the Virgin watches.
The whole house witnesses
as I pray this steep, steep price.
Things You Think While You’re Kneeling on Rice That Have Nothing to Do with Repentance:
I once watched my father peel an orange
without once removing the knife from the fruit.
He just turned and turned and turned it like a globe being skinned. The orange peel becoming a curl, the inside exposed and bleeding. How easily he separated everything that protected the fruit and then passed the bowl to my mother, dropping that skin to the floor while the inside burst between her teeth.
Another Thing You Think While You’re Kneeling on Rice That Has Nothing to Do with Repentance:
My mother has never had soft hands.
Even when I was a child, they were rough from pushing wooden mops and scrubbing tiles.
But when I was little I didn’t mind.
We would walk down the street and I would rub her calluses.
She would smile and say
I was her premio for hard work, I was her premio for patience.
And I loved being her reward.
The golden trophy of her life.
I just don’t know when I got too big for the appointed pedestal.
The Last Thing You Think While You’re Kneeling on Rice That Has Nothing to Do with Repentance:
How you will have deep grain-sized indents on your knees.
How lucky you are your jeans protect the skin from breaking.
How you will be walking slow to school.
How kneeling on pews was never as bad as this.
How neither your father nor brother say anything.
How you feel cold but blood has rushed to your face.
How your fists are clenched but they have nothing to hit.
How the stinging pain shoots up your thighs.
How you’ve never gritted your teeth this tight.
How it hurts less if you force yourself still, still, still.
How pointless these thoughts are. Any of them.
How kissing should never hurt so much.
Leaving
Twin presses a bag
of frozen mixed vegetables against my knees
and another against my cheek.
“You’re lucky, you know.
She’s growing old.
She didn’t make you kneel very long.”
And with the stings
still fresh on my skin I’m not in a place to nod.
But I know it’s true.
“Xio. Just don’t get in trouble until we can leave.
Soon we can leave for college.”
I’ve never heard Twin sound so desperate, never thought he dreamed of leaving just like me.
I try not to be resentful he skipped a grade and will escape sooner.
I try not to be upset at his soft touch.
I elbow him away, afraid of how my hands want to hurt everything around me.
What Do You Need from Me?
Is such a simple question.
But when Caridad texts Twin the message to show to me, I look at him and hand the phone back.
I’m not mad that he told her.
I know they’re both just worried.
But all I need is to give in to what I wouldn’t let myself do in front of Mami: I curl into a ball and weep.
Consequences
My mother drops the word no like a hundred grains of rice.
I will kneel in these, too.
No cell phone.
No lunch money.
No afternoons off from church.
No boys.
No texting.
No hanging out after school.
No freedom.
No time to myself.
No getting out of confession with Father Sean this Sunday.
Late That Night
The only person I want to talk to is Aman.
And although Twin offers to let me use his phone, I don’t know what I’d say.
That we had a great day, and that it all fell apart.
That my heart hurts more than my knees.