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(a sestina...with no envoi)
Mamita was a woman of bony feet, Dark eyes that burned against light Skin. Black hair so fine it wld turn to ash In your fingers. Her husband, my grandfather, Pablo bore witness to her life in brown House shoes. Shuffling through memory. I remember
Cousins’ birthday parties & folding tables. Every member Of the 12-and-under crew slapping concrete with bare feet Because rubber sandals slowed us down. So ash Gathered between our toes, remnants of cigarettes Pablo Refused to smoke but Mamita loved. The end of a Marlboro lit Up like a star during summer block parties and “brown-
Outs” (we did not call them black cus brown Was all we knew). During Mah Jong games the ash Wld fall onto the brite yellow plastic table cloth. Devoted Pablo Playing with the grandkids, as old ladies tapped red clawed feet Against the table’s metal legs. I could never remember How to play the game rite, so I sat twirling the light
In between strands of my hair. I was the lightest Of my cousins, and Mamitas favorite. Our native brown, The color of coconuts and deep fried pork, gleamed in Pablo’s Skin alone, which age had tucked into elephant-folds. He never remembered The questions he asked me. Instead, he’d sprinkle baby powder like ashes On the backs of our necks. This WWII General who never admitted defeat
Even when diabetes swallowed Mamita’s left foot, whole. She never sacrificed her luxuries to her disease. So the sweet brown Coke confections sat in her blood and ate her from the inside. Pablo And Mommy and Tita Giselle pleading with Mamita, “don’t you remember What the Doctor said? Ano Kaba?” But spoiled, beautiful, light- Skinned Mamita, would rather turn to ash
Then to deny herself what she deserved. A garden of ashes, A testament to bull-headedness. Mamita stood up to death on one good foot. Refused to listen to Mommy. Would not remember When to take her shots. Drinking down warm brown Branded liquid to bubble in her veins. No antidotes, just light Dancing on the rim of the glass. And Pablo
With his hands clasped in prayer, on her deathbed. Pablo Crying at the crematorium. Mommy took pictures to remember The look on Mamita’s face before blood turned to ash. I don’t understand her motives, but the ways of brown Skinned people are funny. We stumble in the light & tango on tightropes with falling feet.
******************* a woman like me needs to own her own galleries write her own anthologies needs blueberry bagels for breakfast coconut rice for lunch pork chops & glasses of wine for dinner nothing but a string of pearls and some moisturizer to bed
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