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I. Letter to an Immigrant Father
You could not see mother's back curved like a scythe as she bent down, tearing weeds and words of anger rehearsed only for the privacy of her mind. You could not see hands planted deep into the soil, and sweat falling like a bunch of grapes yanked from its vine. You, who will not understand a word of this. 10 years she waited under the sun, 10 years for a pool of wrinkles to ripple past the stones in her eyes? Why?
No, I will not cross my hands over my lap or cross my feet swollen like loaves in their pans. My back stands tall like a blade. I am not afraid to look back into the sun, walk right up to your face, into the piercing decibels and go deaf with joy.
I will not become my mother dead standing at the stove under the burned out lamp turning the eggs in a bath of nervous vegetable oil; dead sitting at the sewing machine, the needle sharper than a pencil, faster, but not as free; dead lying still beneath the sweat-soaked sheets, she said, "Come talk to me ... I'm lonely."
"You call the bank about the loan?"
"Yes. I talked to a machine."
Open prescription bottles stood like smoke stacks a mile away on the dresser next to a lit candle for Saint Judas, and you even further away, sat on the floor, reciting Hail Marys, pulling each bead out of a steady grip, where the only warmth in the room came from a television screen.
II. Riding Shotgun 3 Hours South With My Best Friend
Don't get married, I wish I had the courage to tell her. Two weeks
away, driving three hours south because he refused to pay thousands
for their wedding night. "But you could pay $6,000 for a stupid
TV," she argued, replaying the fight they had the night prior.
I was a broken record for the first hour, "He didn't ... He didn't."
Each time more exaggerated for her sake. Her mother sat in the
back seat, both arms crossed over a pink glossy purse over her
lap. She smiled the whole ride, camelback hills racing by at 65mph.
Her English was limited to Hello and How are you,
but she could recognize sex, so we called it duty
instead when he said he expected duty everyday once married.
"Does your mother know about all this?" I asked. She shook her
head and looked up into the rearview mirror to see that same smile.
She paused a second, "My mother hasn't been to the ocean in 30
years," as if that was their secret, which translated
to, "My mother has been married 30 years." She glanced intermittently
into the rearview mirror, looking back for fear of what lay ahead.
I imagine time at the other end of a yardstick, my foot heavy on a gas pedal, driving three hours south, crows pecking at road-kill on the asphalt up a distance, and an old bride in the back seat who never knew the language of death. How it lets you free at first, like a squirrel's sprint across asphalt in mid-aftemoon. How he will free you from living at home with your father in two weeks. The sudden impact was unexpected, like catching a football in the gut, but you should have seen it coming.
III. "We Only Do It Once A Week, If That."
He had raised his voice like two fists in the air. Who would want to listen
to that? Not me. I can't even remember why he cried. He remembers
every word of that conversation because pain does that to memory,
puts it right in front like when you leave the avocados in front
of the milk jug and say, "I won't let them go bad this time."
He never forgets. I forget. But I remember the two fists in the
air, shouting that shook the sparrows straight from the sycamore
tree next to us, like tiny droplets of water after washing off
parsley in the sink. My father could shout like that too, make
his eyes invisible where you only see gray veins tanned pink rise
up around his eyes, but I almost do not see that either. You see,
the shouting makes me flinch my eyes so much I hardly see a thing.
Maybe that's why I can't remember my boyfriend's words —
I hardly saw him that night. When I try to remember something,
I think of boxes. Yeah, boxes. My skin like a box. Inside, a dried
clitoris left behind like a raisin caught in the shadowed comer.
Sweet as hell though, no matter how long it's left behind. I can't
remember who put it inside that box. I try not to blame anyone
but myself. Sometimes I thought he might have done it. Don't you
think it should rest outside it, like a trophy on a shelf? Or
hold it in my palm, sweet as it is, savor it like memory or pain.
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