what good is singing to describe
this barrio’s version of the shortened sky,
el cielo cortado —power lines crisscrossing
so high, that blue only teases through them.
And what for fog la niebla arrastra,
creeping down las calles inmóviles
before the bank and grocery store open.
Y por la zapatería on Liberty Avenue,
a lady’s antique boot for a street sign.
And by the shoemaker’s
What use to remember in any language
my father was a Puerto Rican shoe salesman.
From his mouth dangled a ropy, ashy cigarette.
He spoke good English and knew when to smile.
fishing nets
With his strong fingers he’d knot shoes like redes,
knew three kinds of knots so lady customers
could buy the shoes they loved to look at
but really shouldn’t have worn.
At home, Dad kept his lengua íntima
to himself. His Spanish not for children,
only older relatives who forced him to speak,
reminded, Spanish means there’s another person
inside you . All beauty, he’d argue, no power in it.
Still, I remember, he spoke a hushed Spanish
to customers who struggled in English, the ones
he pitied for having no language to live on.
So many years gone, what use to invent
or question him in Pittsburgh? The educated one,
why would I want my clumsy Spanish to stray
from the pages of books outward? My tongue,
he’d think so untrue and inarticulate. Each word
having no past in it. What then? Speaking Spanish
to make them better times or Pittsburgh
a better place. En vez de regresar la dura realidad
del pasado. And then, if I choose to speak like this
who will listen?
Instead of returning
to the hard reality
of the past
ODE TO GLASS
After its lip
the bottle flares out
like the A-line of
a girl’s skirt
when she twirls
at recess.
On the descent
the company’s crest—
one red and one blue
crescent about to
clasp together
into a globe
but between
them, the name
of the soda sits
in bold, white letters.
Below
the slogan
the tiny print:
contenido neto 355 ml,
and hecho en México,
in perfectly
executed paint.
Partway down
the bottle corners
into a barrel-shape,
the swiveled glass,
the same as stripes
of a barber’s pole, forces
the eye to follow
and twist along its
blurred contours,
the way skin blurs
the contours of
an arm so you
slow down into
the elbow’s nook.
And how much
like skin the peach
and brown and blue
reflections inside
the glass lend it
dimension while outside
the surface and shape
are seamless, but
for some stitching
underneath, a zipper
dialed around the
bottle’s base to
serve as feet.
And where
the glass corners
from cone to barrel
a ring carved from
the bottles being
packed too close
and rubbing together
in their crates.
Scars that
keep dry and
soft as silk, even as
the glass beads, and
you start to trace
the droplets back
over the powder,
and still dry after
you’ve swabbed up
the condensation
and your fingers
have gone clumsy
from the bottle’s
brittle sweat.
When the bottle’s
this cold, the swivels
of glass are charged,
icy bulbs that steal
heat from the nubs
of your fingertips,
so you rub them
to your forehead
and feel nothing
but your own heat
swirl back and forth
from your head
to your hand.
Each time you drink—
the bubbles rising up
through the sweet,
brown liquid, stirring
your nose, then lips—
how easily details
of time slip away and
you’re seven-years-old
again drinking Pepsi
at the sari-sari store
next to Uncle Ulpe’s
house in Manila. And
you guzzle it down.
BAPTISM
The taller men with baseball bats, a tree branch garbled with knots,
log iron, and leftover pipe from the fence they put up last summer.
The shorter men gripping buck knives for slashing at the pig’s neck.
And ripened on a dry slop of peanuts, cornflakes, and newspaper
shavings, moiled between the washer and dryer and shelves of dust-caked
soda bottles, the pig that grew tall enough to sniff and lick the
this barrio’s version of the shortened sky,
el cielo cortado —power lines crisscrossing
so high, that blue only teases through them.
And what for fog la niebla arrastra,
creeping down las calles inmóviles
before the bank and grocery store open.
Y por la zapatería on Liberty Avenue,
a lady’s antique boot for a street sign.
And by the shoemaker’s
What use to remember in any language
my father was a Puerto Rican shoe salesman.
From his mouth dangled a ropy, ashy cigarette.
He spoke good English and knew when to smile.
fishing nets
With his strong fingers he’d knot shoes like redes,
knew three kinds of knots so lady customers
could buy the shoes they loved to look at
but really shouldn’t have worn.
At home, Dad kept his lengua íntima
to himself. His Spanish not for children,
only older relatives who forced him to speak,
reminded, Spanish means there’s another person
inside you . All beauty, he’d argue, no power in it.
Still, I remember, he spoke a hushed Spanish
to customers who struggled in English, the ones
he pitied for having no language to live on.
So many years gone, what use to invent
or question him in Pittsburgh? The educated one,
why would I want my clumsy Spanish to stray
from the pages of books outward? My tongue,
he’d think so untrue and inarticulate. Each word
having no past in it. What then? Speaking Spanish
to make them better times or Pittsburgh
a better place. En vez de regresar la dura realidad
del pasado. And then, if I choose to speak like this
who will listen?
Instead of returning
to the hard reality
of the past
ODE TO GLASS
After its lip
the bottle flares out
like the A-line of
a girl’s skirt
when she twirls
at recess.
On the descent
the company’s crest—
one red and one blue
crescent about to
clasp together
into a globe
but between
them, the name
of the soda sits
in bold, white letters.
Below
the slogan
the tiny print:
contenido neto 355 ml,
and hecho en México,
in perfectly
executed paint.
Partway down
the bottle corners
into a barrel-shape,
the swiveled glass,
the same as stripes
of a barber’s pole, forces
the eye to follow
and twist along its
blurred contours,
the way skin blurs
the contours of
an arm so you
slow down into
the elbow’s nook.
And how much
like skin the peach
and brown and blue
reflections inside
the glass lend it
dimension while outside
the surface and shape
are seamless, but
for some stitching
underneath, a zipper
dialed around the
bottle’s base to
serve as feet.
And where
the glass corners
from cone to barrel
a ring carved from
the bottles being
packed too close
and rubbing together
in their crates.
Scars that
keep dry and
soft as silk, even as
the glass beads, and
you start to trace
the droplets back
over the powder,
and still dry after
you’ve swabbed up
the condensation
and your fingers
have gone clumsy
from the bottle’s
brittle sweat.
When the bottle’s
this cold, the swivels
of glass are charged,
icy bulbs that steal
heat from the nubs
of your fingertips,
so you rub them
to your forehead
and feel nothing
but your own heat
swirl back and forth
from your head
to your hand.
Each time you drink—
the bubbles rising up
through the sweet,
brown liquid, stirring
your nose, then lips—
how easily details
of time slip away and
you’re seven-years-old
again drinking Pepsi
at the sari-sari store
next to Uncle Ulpe’s
house in Manila. And
you guzzle it down.
BAPTISM
The taller men with baseball bats, a tree branch garbled with knots,
log iron, and leftover pipe from the fence they put up last summer.
The shorter men gripping buck knives for slashing at the pig’s neck.
And ripened on a dry slop of peanuts, cornflakes, and newspaper
shavings, moiled between the washer and dryer and shelves of dust-caked
soda bottles, the pig that grew tall enough to sniff and lick the
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