she tells the tale
from beginning to end
omitting no details
she includes the exposition
the rising action
and the climax
her wrist sliding into the air
with a blue band
so proud
only her mother’s daughter
could she be
my storyteller extraordinaire
it could be the Spanish-English mix
from the nanny’s mouth as we sat in the zoo,
my thoughts of the last day of summer
slipping from my hands
quicker than the tears
my baby cried to sleep with,
or the anger inside
that someone would pay another
for everything i love the most.
it could be the defriending,
his cold absence of words in my presence,
or her emphatic insistence
that eight months is enough
time with her baby
when a thousand years
would not satiate me.
it could be the story i love
coming to a bittersweet end,
or the small voices
absent from my home
on the one day when
i need them most.
but i will never be quite able
to define what haunts me.
i cannot replicate the complex crest
nor mimic la bandera de España.
i cannot be the arms of your mother
or speak coherently her tongue.
i can only pour in the ingredients,
spin the mixer of all we desire,
and place before you in red and yellow
everything your presence means to me.
i cannot say in words what the cake will tell
in so many sweet remembrances,
so many little tastes that sparkle
like the teardrops in the corners of her eyes.
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