Pump Water from the Well

This is no shatter and stone.
Come skip toes in my chest Salvador.
I’m done been the shortest shore.
¿And did you love all the self out of you for me?
I want you to torch the thatch above my head.
To be estero. To be mangroves.
There are mornings I wake with taste of tortillas in warmed up milk.
There are mangos no one listens to.
¿Is this the shatter you imagined for me?
Everywhere is war.
I want to scrape your hair as wind asks from stars.
Hold my hands above mine.
Whistle the patch of dirt I pumped water from to bathe.
Simmer down to chickens, dogs, parakeets.
This was my block.
The one I want to shut off with rain.
Where I want to plant an island.
Barrio Guadalupe hijueputa born and bread cerote que onda.
The most beautiful part of my barrio was stillness—
A rustling of wings caught in the pattering soil that calls me to repair it.
Don’t tell me I didn’t bring the estero up north where there’s none.
I’ve walked uptown. I saw Mrs. Gringa.
The riff between my fingers whispered in whirlpools.
Silence stills me. Pense quedarme aquí I said.
I don’t understand she said.
From my forehead, the jaw of a burro, hit on the side and scraped by a lighter to wake the
song that speaks two worlds.
The kind of terrifying current.
The kind of ruinous wind.