Turn Tail and Run

Today in Oswego, NY, the horror that is my hometown, the snow has piled up about two feet over night. The landlord is out snow-blowing the sidewalk and my car is covered like a wedding cake. I open the back door and want to turn tail and hide.  It’s still snowing as I shovel.

The thing about snow here is that it is unyielding. Once the lake decides to let loose, Oswego and the surrounding area is in for a cold and fluffy day. I’ve seen snow in this area be as high as thirteen feet and you would not believe it unless you’ve seen it yourself. The snow banks has been over my head by many feet and driving around them is a circus act.

I recall the scalding heat of Houston as I shovel snow. I used to ride my bike to the Circle K in the dead of summer. The heat would radiate from my flesh so hot when I got back home that one ice cube to my brow melted by the time I reached the next brow with it. The dead of winter in Oswego is so bitter cold that my skin feels the sting like Houston’s summer heat. The ice is strong here. The cold mocks my flesh and bones. I cannot hide, instead I shovel off my porch and mutter to myself “When I grow up, I’m moving back to Houston, TX. Heck, anywhere the sun lives, I’m goin’ …San Antonio …Hawaii …Mexico …Africa. Anywhere but here. Any, doggone, where but here.”

The Children and I in Winter

On assignment from Donna Steiner, one of my professors, I wrote this poem today.  The poem was to be structured in  7-7-5-5 syllable fashion.

The Children and I in Winter

We’ve got snow up to our ears.
Oswego New York is cold,
six ear lobes are blue,
the wind finds us all.

Porch lit

The deep red
carpet was suffocating in the living room
that was hotter than a porch lit barrio on a Saturday night
I sat out there watching
for my momma to come home from the dance club
it was nearly midnight
but the blood spattered pavement still held Houston’s heatwave
like a policed fist
to a Cholo jaw.
Jessie held his girl tight
as if she could save him from the police.
Ramon let loose,
the disco of a broken heel,
jumping on the back of the cop
then thrown back to the pavement.

A second squad car approached
batons drawn,
aimed at skin,
instead of shins.
A hiss of red
dancing on the ground again
and again.
I held my burning breath.
I could not move-
Momma wasn’t home in time.
Jessie was taken
to jail and Ramon called me a bitch
for holding my breath and watching from my porch lit seat,
on a Saturday night, in the barrio.

Ten Everywhere had some good interview questions

Ten Everywhere had some good interview questions, but I am only using these five because I thought it would be an excellent exercise in nonfiction:

1. The love letter – where did you get it?
-I get all my love letters from Olivia. She is my sweet little romantic. I like it because I used to write love letters to my dad to show him how much I truly cared for him. I recall loving him so much that I had to write about it. It’s easy to imagine that she feels that way about me.  I definitely feel that way about her. My Johnny shows he loves me by making art. He writes comics and draws wildly detailed monsters or heroes to express how he loves me. I hang those pictures on the wall, the fridge and stuff them in keepsake books too. My children are everything.

2. Go to your IPod, hit random, what song is playing? What does that song mean to you?
-”Orange Moon” by Erykah Badu. This song is the one I want to hear when kissing someone for the first time or when writing poetry late at night. Erykah plays this song with such heartfelt passion for music. It’s loose and sexy in note and form. I adore it. I’d hit repeat on this one.

3. Describe one thing that you do religiously (beside read the bible).
-I write poetry. I don’t always have inspiration but when I first wake up I am still shaking off dreams and the poetry is there with it. Sometimes I can catch it and write it down, other times it is just a word or phrase…

4. What is your favorite piece of art? Why?
-I really like performance art. I think Miranda July’s The Hallway in The Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan (http://mirandajuly.com/art) is truly amazing. Miranda is so articulate in stating the human condition and consciousness, I can only hope my work can become as mesmerizing as hers.

5. What is the worst part of writing?
-Sometimes, the words come out wrong. They sound haughty or offensive or worse yet, they sound boring or uninteresting and no one wants to read that. Not connecting with your reader is the worst thing that can happen in writing.

Describe your next project in 10 words (no more, no less):
-I’m reading “Roasted Christmas” essay at The Electric Radio Show.

Tacoland

I was there!

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113892215

So there was this punk rock moment in Queen Viktoria’s history where I visited my little brother at Tacoland in San Antonio, Texas.   Moses, my littlest brother, was (still is) a hardcore punk rawker!  I was three months pregnant with my son, Johnny Angel at the time.

When NPR ran a cover on Ram Ayala’s legacy, his club, Tacoland,  and the history of punk rock music in San Antonio, Texas.  I was taken back to that night; it was special.  I was enthralled to see that the place is the very same one Moses took me to.  He’d kept saying that the punk rock scene was there.  The bands that played there are big deals now, but that night, Tacoland was the backdrop to getting to know my punk kid brother.  I loved every minute of it!

Moses and I talked and listened to the music.  He was sixteen years old then.   It had been years since we’d visited, he lived with my cousin (long story), and we talked about everything from the baby to past punk show’s we’d witnessed.  Moses was amazed that I was going to be having a kid and that he would be called Tio.  He kept touching my belly, suggesting names for a boy or girl.  He said some of his friends called him Sesom to show respect.  I raised an eyebrow and called him Mosey, his baby name.  Isaid, “Mosey, I ain’t name this kids Sesom, so just forget it.”  We laughed, because we knew that he is “Mosey” forever to me and I think he liked having a big sister to tell him how it is for a change.

I was happy to be spending time with him as we sat on bar stools of the punk show.   I recall the place being hip beyond anything I’d seen in London, Chicago or New York.  The punks were fierce.  Chicano rockers dressed in garb from crusty punk to rockabilly punk.  I felt at home and Moses seemed to know everybody including the owner, Ram.   We’d been early and they were setting up the stage.  Moses introduced me briefly, it was just a quick, “Hey this is my sister” to which Ram said, “Hey,” and kept walking by with an amp or something.   Then he  introduced me to his girlfriend in store-bought-punk-fashion.   I didn’t like her.  She was a poser and whined a lot, which we avoided like the plague.

I wish I’d known that the venue was punk history in the making.   Ram Ayala kept the place friendly in a way that seemed like family was congregated.  I kept the focus on Moses and my precious little time with him.  I missed him.  I miss him still.  I don’t remember the punk  band that was playing, I just remember that I like it.  I remember that even though he was in high demand, Moses spent all of his time talking to me about everything he could think of.  Tacoland kept familia close together.

I’m sorry to hear of our Chicano loss.  Ram Ayala was shot and killed four years ago by thugs who robbed him of the night till.  The building now sits empty in his honor.  I’ve seen Moses once since that night because the punk rock life took him on a path that included hopping trains across the Americas and singing in his own punk band called “The Poser Elite”.  It was at a family reunion where Tio Moses got to hold in his hands Johnny Angel, the baby he’d only felt in my belly at the punk show a year before.

The Reflecting Pool

The Reflecting Pool

.

On the brightest day

the shaded grey stone

greets me as timeless, wet, and cool;

I kick my feet against the wall I’d entered near…

Pausing briefly, looking back

**

I admire the girth of my kick;

The span of water and space

is noteworthy

between the wall and my foot.

A spray of warm water over head

rains over me

My arms pull me further still

to the wall; to the wall

I seek the a closer front.

The wall is beyond my swimming hands.

I raise my head to

breathe in for the future

against barrier and for myself preservation.

Dividing waters

guide me through the pool

to the ever closing space and rising surface.

~VAV

(The Office Tavern October 2, 2009 10:30AM)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

from “Rosewater and Aspercreme”

 

Mom is  the kind of grandmother who calls me “Heaven”. She calls all of grandkids “Heaven”. My sister and brother and I crowd her for hugs like puppies at the door. We have to ask if we are going to the buffet place.

“What, Hea-ven?” she asks Papuh. Everyone calls him “Papuh” because he is the little man of the house since Dad moved out. She leans way over to hug him first because he is the baby of the family until Moses is born.

Mom’s butt is wide. Carrie and I are standing next to each other, giggling at the mountain of booty in Mom’s blue polyester pants. Before she turns to us, I am bemused at how enormous her behind is. I wonder if my own will grow to the same girth someday. Mom turns to Carrie and I.

“Heaven!” she says hugging me. Her polyester thighs rub together, whispering like the zephyr of a hurricane. I hug her and my face is lost in the baby blue softness of her blouse. The scent of her hug is an aromatic cloud of rosewater and aspercreme. She kisses my face firmly.

“Can we go to Champs?” Papah asks about the all you can eat breakfast buffet Mom likes to take us to on weekend mornings. I step back while she hugs Carrie. Mom’s smile drapes her whole face as well as any window treatment. I move to the bay window scalloped in white gossamer curtains to buckle my sandals, the sunlight radiates the space all around me.

“How’d you know we were going there, Papah?” Mom says, animatedly widening her eyes to look at him. Papah yips and hollers as we get our sandals on. Carrie helps Ma with her sandals since her belly is so fat with our baby brother, Moses, inside it. She can’t bend down as well anymore.

“But we are going to Church, Heaven,” Mom tells Papah. Then, she turns to Ma and starts to pull on the small amount of loose fabric at the curve that meets the back of her leg.

“Mira mis pantalones, no mas[1]… I think I lost weight, mira [2]” Mom says to Ma as she pulls “My pants are falling off of me, -ira [3]…”

Instead of cooking for us, like other Chicano Grandmas, she drives us to the breakfast buffet at Champs. After we eat, Mom stuffs her purse with pancakes, sausages, donuts, biscuits, anything remotely wrap-up-able.

While the sermon is droning on about heaven and purgatory, we know that the good bounty is in Mom’s purse right next to her tubes of aspercreme and Avon Naturals Hand & Body Lotion with Rosewater. Sometimes, just because it’s there, she pulls out a two hour old sausage link or piece of fruit.

“Here, Heaven, are you hungry,” she says holding it out.

She kept us fed from her purse instead of her stove. The tia’s say we all inherited her big butt and crazy ways. Decades later, I am not amused when my booty does grow to the girth of Mom’s but then again, so does my motherly instinct.

---

 

[1] look at my pants, no doubt…

[2] look

[3] look

an excerpt from The Cowboy Way

My face is sweaty. I don’t like sleeping on a bunch of blankets on the floor. The bedroom I share with my sister and brother has no bed. It takes both hands to wipe the sweat off my face. The electric company turned off the power again. I scowl at the fan for not spinning in the window. The sun is bright outside our room and the asphalt of the street reflects a black orange sheen to the back of my skull when I look outside for my family.

Through the filthy screen door I can see them fighting in the street without getting up from my bed on the floor. Dad is bellowing at Mom to wash his “goddamn clothes” when she screams that she won’t… that she won’t be his good little woman anymore… that he can go ask that puta he was with last night to wash his work clothes… I am afraid of what he might do next. I retreat to the bathroom for solace.

Through the door, I can hear Dad slam the screen door.  He is growling in the living room again. The water flows cool and clean over my hands. I come back to the living room. Outside the peaceful bubble I built around me, the scowl on Dad’s face means that he will need a minute. Marisol, my doll, is on the couch. Dad nudges me swiftly towards the couch. I reach for Marisol, and then sit where she was resting.

“Your mamma don’t love me no more,” Daddy says.  Marisol’s chi-chés are showing. The blouse is raggedy on her, so I put my head down to get a better look. I work at covering the cloth chest of my doll.

“She don’t want me to live here anymore.”

I smell Marisol’s bonnet; it is a gnarly puff of blue bonnet printed cotton. The puff stink stings my nose on the inside, or maybe the tears seeping out are what is doing it.

“I am gonna go back to San Antonio,” Dad says the words sound foreign as the sound in my chest. Daddy kneels down but all I see are the picqos of his black cowboy boots crease at the tips. He bows his head to my shoulder.

“There, there, mija ” he whispers, but  my chest feels like a bullet wound that yelps. This time when he leaves, I know it’ll be for good.

Meanwhile, the wetness of my cheek mirrors the wetness of my brow and I wipe my face on Marisol’s bonnet. She could always handle wearing a wet bonnet.

Governed

Governed

When I’m dead, let me be buried by a writer.

If I’m sleeping, I want to dream of writing.

If I’m awake, I want to be writing.

And when I’m governed, let it be by a writer.

And while I’m alive, I want to be read.

a sneak peek at The Cowboy Way

 Fire flickers in the beads of sweat on their brown shirtless backs.  The men sit around the nightly bonfire eyes half closed, singing, and drunk. 

Tio Larry is so drunk his eyes won’t open, but his mouth does. He opens his mouth wide, as wide as a pomegranate but instead of bursts of juicy seeds, his mouth is filled with loud bursts of the most beautiful baritone songs. They spill out from Mexico. His voice is strong and soulful like his love for Tia Ellie. Daddy plays his trumpet slowly behind Tio Larry. Everyone calls him Tio Larry. He has been around for over twenty years but Tia Ellie won’t ever marry him. He’s a drunk.

I finished brushing my teeth and put on my pretty nightgown. It covers my legs to the floor with ruffles of lace and cotton. Grandma made it for me when I moved in. I feel like a fine lady to have such a long nightgown. It’s late. The sky is black velvet glittered with stars and streetlights. Grandma has gone to bed. The cousins and Tia’s have all gone home.

Outside, the fire pops between the men holding amber bottles of swill. I want to hug Daddy goodnight, but I have to wait for their song to be over. Tio Larry has been singing about the nighttime and broken hearts in Spanish for a long time.  Spanish songs run long when it comes to love, I guess.

Telemundo’s on the TV while I wait for the music to stop outside. El Chesperito is embarrassing himself again. I don’t know what he is saying but he looks funny, so I laugh gently, waiting for my que.

The fire lulls their music to sleep as it dies down. Some more of the men leave; Dad’s friends always leave when the beer runs out. Tio Larry is sound asleep on the ground next to the dying embers.

It seems safe to go and give Daddy a quick hug since most of his friends are gone. One big hug then I can sleep. I gather my lace ruffles up to hop off the bed. The floor is a comfortable cool on the bottom of my feet.

Outside the gravel of the driveway is lukewarm from the heat of the day. The sharp pebbles stick to the soles of my feet as I scamper towards the strong brown back that looks exactly like Dad’s. The sleepy eyed men around the fire point at me and mumble in Spanish.

“Goodnight, Daddy!” I hug his back and almost kiss his check, but he has a beard. Daddy doesn’t have a beard. Tio Larry says, “Oye Viki  pos que! That not you Daddy.” 

The broad-backed man is looking at me, trying to not scare me. But, it’s too late. I dart away like a cat in a bath, my bare feet wounded by the gravel in the driveway. The nightgown ruffles flow behind me and almost get caught in the kitchen screen door. I hop back into bed next to my slumbering little sister and brother.  Embarrassed, I dig the pebbles between my toes out. Daddy comes into my room a few moments later.

“Hey, what happen, Prieta?” I started to cry and told him about the stranger with the same color skin as him. Daddy laughs openly at my silliness while washing the dirt from my feet.  Tucking all my ruffles of lace under the blankets with me, gives a hug goodnight, then he turns out the light.

“Ey que Prieta,” he smiles at me in the darkness, shaking his head. The aroma beer wafts through the air from his breath and kiss to the temple goodnight.  I still dislike the smell of beer breath on kisses goodnight.

He pats my hair one more time before he goes back to his friends through the whence of a screen door. All is quiet inside the house. The darkness holds me in lace and cotton like a hug. The dreams find me fast. ~VAVP