“Te conozco bacalao
Aunque vengas disfrazao” 

Don’t forget the times
you and Tata made pasteles

for ten hours, bare feet on the 

stained tiles of her kitchen, 

brows wet with sweat, 

hands yellow with masa,  

rolling plantain leaves 

until the day started to rust 

and the sun went down. 

No te olvides de tu esencia,

that you are made 

of ocean salt, your mind is sharp as rays 

splintered by palm leaves,

and when the sun touches your skin, 

it doesn’t burn, it shines

like copper, golden like beach sand. 

When you move away to live in buildings 

taller than our mountains,   

when your words start to shed 

rhythm, don’t forget  

that your veins carry an island. 

LPCH

“Unlike the academic world in which I spend most of my time, in my home world, heritage - not title and position - is central to identity. To be disconnected from that identity means losing not only the ability to explain one’s essence to others but also any potential for self knowledge as well.” 

 Teach them fluency, you say, 

As if my kids were affluent, 

As if we had time to play

Around. 

Can you not hear their voices

Already, 

Gathered in the playground, 

Improvising like rappers, 

Swapping words like poets? 

Fluency flowing like water! 

This is not the time

To help you hear instead of
Listen 

To their fluency. 

We do not have the time 

To watch your kids reach the finish 

Line  

While your fluency leaves mine 

Behind. 

——-

Let me have my words,
My language is power! 

Lo más cool about my language 

Is that it is heavy 

With history, 

Brimming with
Identity. 

Deja que mis palabras broten 

With latinity,
Let my words dance Salsa
Y Plena Libre, 

Let my language

Move her hips!  

I’m not from here, 

Yo soy de allá, 

So let me keep my homeland
When I speak,
Déjame ser bilingual.
Just let me be
Free!
Adiós to your hegemony. 

LPCH

“Children have the right to their own language, their own culture. We must fight cultural hegemony and fight the system by insisting that children be allowed to express themselves in their own language style. It is not they, the children, who must change, but the schools. To push children to do anything else is repressive and reactionary.” 

Baby Fever

 My wife is more forgiving than I am.
She can hold our cats in her arms only
Minutes after they’ve ripped through the toilet paper,
Shattered a glass.
Not me. I’ll pass on that, 
Give them the silent treatment.
And yet I’m the one that wants children, 
The thought sometimes insistent as a kid that can’t sit still,
Irrational and enduring as a craving at midnight.

The toils of motherhood were well understood 

By my sister and I.
Mami liked to shatter taboos like rain does the silence,
So we always knew that she did not like having children.
In fact, if she could go back in time, 

her future intact, 

I would not be alive.
So what is it that makes me react to the sight 

of big bald heads and toothless smiles?
And no, I’m not talking about my wife’s residents,

They’ve already been presidents and CEOs,
I cannot love them despite their senile innocence.
How is it that miles of warnings cannot abate
This foolish desire?
Nature is so indifferent to human will
that now at thirty it has me succumbing to the
thrill of changing diapers.
And how I hate cleaning the litter…
But don’t worry, I’m not one to perpetuate cycles. 

My wife is patient with our cats
And I have my plants to speak for my humanity.
I water the soil even if it’s barren, 

With barely a twig for a leaf to hold onto. 

Something about life emerging after decay

Has me waiting expectantly
Day in, day out,
Like a village prays for rain after a drought.
I’ve seen how years have the power to renew
To offer love, a chance to start anew
As inexplicably as seasons.
This must be one of the reasons I can tend to a garden,
But children? 

I’ve never known the pride of our achievements
To overcome regret. 

“If I could do it all over again,” mami always said.

So my wife is patient with our cats
And I have my plants to take care of. 

LPCH

This is perfection, 
Mornings tucked under the limp weight of a loose blanket, 
Sunshine smearing our long windows like a painting,
(We got lucky with these windows, didn't we?)
The light stomps of little paws making their way to our 
Devoted attention. 
This is perfection. 

This is perfection
Also, 
Mornings in which my eyes still refuse light, 
My head, dizzy from the last two dreams or so, 
My heart throbbing heavy with last night's wine, 
The alarm reminding me of the time, 
like a warning, 
And you, coming to me from the kitchen, 
a silhouette still, 
Settling down the mug, turning on the lamp, 
Kissing my forehead with a sense of protection
reminiscent of safe childhoods. 
This is also perfection. 

This is perfection, 
The crackling of the old oven, 
The chopping of vegetables,
(I will always peel the garlic,
You're more suited for onions or tomatoes), 
And the music blaring in the background with defiance, 
With this heat, the feat of reading recipes, checking the pasta, 
Refilling the wine, almost feels like a challenge, 
But how we love this new connection we have found.
This is perfection. 

This is perfection, 
Too, 
Long days at work and 
leftovers in the microwave, 
Little sleep, panic attacks, 
The way you meet my mood swings 
With affection, 
This, too, is perfection. 

Perfection, 
Like driving down the freeway, 
Choosing new playlists, making fun of
each other's songs, holding hands on open roads, 
Getting our cameras ready, 
Trying to drive steady while you shoot
road signs and anything that says JESUS! 
Bickering over speed limits, and dreaming about 
Destinations. 
(I love that you're always dreaming)
This is perfection. 

You insist on pulling me closer when I'm angry, 
Like saving a castaway, 
As if I was to slip, 
Vanish from the earth without your grip,
And when I fear that one day you won't fight for me so 
Intently, you treat my panic with your patience, 
You show me no objection. 
Loving you is perfection. 

Let me pinch you when we go up the stairs 
With our heavy groceries forever, 
Tease me about the things that I say, 
My dramatic ways, my bad driving, 
Let me be the first one 
That you call when you get off of work
Until we no longer recognize our names, 
And you have annoyed me completely,
And I have driven you crazy, 
And we have become like your residents, 
And are but another funny story at the kitchen table.
Let me lay my head on your shoulder before going to sleep
Until your arm turns numb
For every year to come, 
Let me always be the one you love without exception.
Being married to you is perfection.

LPCH

I cracked the code, it was never me, 
It must've been that day you tried to crack 
My head
With your jumbo bodied 
Guitar, 
The day I jumped out of (y)our moving van
In Middle of Nowhere, Pennsylvania,
Sat on the grass by the howling
Highway, only to discover I had no lighter. 
That's how I lost my passport and all the possessions 
In my wallet, trying to find that lighter, 
And not even the smooth relief 
Of a cigarette on a cracked head 
Came out of it. 

... 

We made it to the festival by midnight. 
You said that I sat on the left to show off 
My bumps and bruises, 
A lump, 
As big, as blue, 
As a beautiful mountain at dusk. 
Come to think of it, I did;
I wore my wounds
Like a distance runner 
Wears a medal after crossing the finish line. 
And we sat there drinking shine
Among the others, 
Under the silver halo of a glorious moon. 

"Another shot please, for the girls 
With The Peace"


...

Every time we fought we lost 
Something precious, 
The amethyst in Vermont, 
Our voices 
On the roads of New Hampshire; 
I remember the day like the scent of perfume, 
Early blue, clean as sunlight, 
Battling each other with icepicks for daggers,
Fragile minds, our life
An eggshell, 
Screams piercing the morning like shards of glass, 
Or the day I lost my birthday Vans at the resting stop in 
Binghamton, New York, 
Where half my body dangled 
Out the door, flailing like a pig 
That knows it's being slaughtered. 
You gripped my feet, 
Tossed my shoes 
So I would not run, 
But if it wasn't love, 
What was it that you were trying to keep, 
Holding on like a blood stain to white sheets? 
It's ok, I didn't know how to tell you
I didn't like them anyway. 

One day 
Like a shaft among shadows, 
Direct and determined as a weapon, 
Your voice, soft against my ear, 
Like a breeze reaching the edge 
Of a rabid ocean, 
And the glow of your grey eyes
- two full moons- 
melting like sundown in the rearview 
Of a quiet drive, 
The thought of your kiss, 
Like suspended silence between a clash 
Of wild thunder, 
Brought forth onto this stoic face 
A smile. 

I have seen the color from the mountains, 
Witnessed peaks bronze into shades of copper, 
The air crisp like dollar bills, 
Seen leaves scatter from the hills of Appalachia, 
Watched them float like hammocks, 
Flutter like tired wings - dutifully - 
Like a cat that knows its dying day, 
Obedient to the season like migrating birds. 
I have shuddered from the breeze 
Of still sunsets, 
Lost my mind in lava skies of soft magenta, and prayed 
Like the pious to each blazing star at night. 
I have nursed myself by fires, 
Desperately counting on that last twig for ignition, 
Seen visions in the flames - 
A wolf once sat by me for hours as we watched the logs swelter and recede 
Like fistfuls of sand- 
And still I cannot understand 
Loss, but I can accept it.
I have plucked guitars, mandolins, 
Banged on djembes, tambourines, 
Danced madly, high on my love for folk music, 
Celebrated the harvest to the tunes of Neil Young. 
     Yes, I have loved it all. 
But I have also seen the fall during strawberry mornings in our apartment, 
The way the light melts into pools, like a carpet of sunshine
As you scrape the jelly on the toast and the cats sleep by the window
And I have loved that most. 

LBCH