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Letras

The Rose That Waits
The Rose That Waits Like my past It lies inside a trunk Inside an empty box Of chocolates tasted decades ago It lies quietly bent and shapeless Lost its color and life In darkness it waits For fresh air perhaps For the touch of my hand The feel of my lips My past waits for me To admire its beauty To relive its history To explore its withered remains The dead rose of my life lies Inside my bygone...
My Mother’s Suitcase
My Mother’s Suitcase A chalky black suitcase Holds deeds for burial plots Prepaid instructions On the use of morgues Spider webs and dust A time bomb The lesson waiting to explode To scatter my childhood wildly Over the course of a few weeks Some scenes never to be found Others to reappear In future unsuitable places My mother’s suitcase Will decide our lives until their end Like the Arc of the...
Origin of a Drug Addict
Origin of a Drug Addict Mr. Bloom’s candy store: oak shelves glass barrel jars creaking floor slats stray cats nickel bars with names like Hollywood Pay Day Zagnut Holy Communion: Necco Wafers and Grape Crush Violet squares in silver foil, dissolve into lilac toilet water on the tongue. Bubble Gum cigarettes fake smoke to feel glamorous sexy, skinny, blonde and blue-eyed, in our everything but...
Saturday Stand-Off
Saturday Stand-Off It smells like chuletas en casa de Titi. My stomach gurgles, I stare at the cat; the only safe place to look. Mami’s in a slapping mood. The cat looks like Igor all joroba’o when he digs in to yawn. Titi named him Yo-Yo on account of his moods. Mami esta quejándose about the broken machine at the el laundry how it swallowed her quarter and didn’t move como mari’o que no sirve...
The Two-Headed Puerto Rican
The Two-Headed Puerto Rican Spanish mouth wakes up commuters on the D train delicious dirty laugh replete with innuendo, fleshy memory and unbridled lust for telling it like it is in the mixed company of Prada and Route 66. Spanish mouth can recite, sing, Boricua literary and musical canons simultaneously explaining what Commonwealth really means while ordering un sandwich de jamón y queso on pan...
DEAR GIRL, REMEMBER
DEAR GIRL, REMEMBER Dear girl, Remember that your arrival was bloody Your mother's screams your birth song That you drowned into life This life ain't for the weak Never let your knees buckle Submission won't be your repertoire Dear girl, They will lick away your sentiments Grind away your resolve, cast aside your emotion But they'll never find your heart These hearts buried deep in memories...
BLOODSTAINS
BLOODSTAINS They are still trying to cover the bloodstains Bisabuela They are stomping the ground hoping the dust clouds will cover their disdain Attempting to drown chocolate skin in goat’s milk Blaming dark flecks on Spanish pixie dust Swallowing melanin as if their excretions are the only brown they know They rather expel you Discount your struggle because no one remembers you well It is hard...
Nuyorican Tales
Nuyorican Tales My heart beats to the rhythm of the clave Caribbean sun-kissed skin Mi piel… café con leche Evidence of a tainted ancestry Coffee bean colored… These are the eyes of my mother Raised by the Bronx Musing on medleys of salsa Pouring Celia, Hector, Frankie &Ruben From apartment windows Inspiring spontaneous song and dance From locals watching games of domino On city sidewalks...
La Operación
La Operación Can you hear The silent sobs of Babies crying? A generation lost Mass genocide of our future They talk in whisssssss-pers No one knows them Hundreds of thousands of Singers, writers, maestras, doctors, politicians, actors, Mothers, fathers, hermanas, lovers and friends Look into their faces 40 years of women robbed 40 years of girls destroyed 40 years of bodies scarred 40 years of...
THE SHOEMAKER
THE SHOEMAKER You are a shoemaker of great skill with an inherent ability to create a shoe so beautiful that one ignores the distortion of the toes, the blisters at the heel, the bunions of conformity. You did not know your father well but became more skillful than he at placing these handmade shoes on the feet of whomever you wanted to see dance in them. Dance a dance that pleased you. Dance a...

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