It is five o’clock in Callao and it’s
getting dark and there’s a piece of
me somewhere on this sidewalk that
I can’t find, and you are of no help,
you are of no use.
You are just The Peruvian now. A face
that floats into a crowd in Lima, a voice
that echoes in an alley in el Rímac, a palm
tree in San Borja. I was always so sad
with you, and I didn’t know why. I thought
it was me, a missing jigsaw puzzle piece that
would be found under a neighbors sofa in a year
or two. It was never me. In the end, it became
a lot of you as you lashed out and I withdrew
so deep into myself that there are moments that
I still don’t remember my name, like the millisecond
of time between the changing film reels.
The happy moments were with your sisters in Lima.
Pisco sours and anticuchos in Barranco
and then we went to that bar that used to be a
home from your colonial-era, and I could swear that
I still have the business
card in a purse somewhere. I was digging
through my jewelry box for a pair of earrings,
and I found my rings and for a second it was almost amnesiac,
whose are these? Where did they come from? And the
soles were at the bottom, and I remembered paying for
lúcuma ice cream with them at Larcomar, the
breeze whispering into my hair.
I remember your Tío Pepe and how he
treated me like I’d always wished you did. Belly laughs.
Hermosísima. Tia Flor and the jewelry she gave me.
La Chata and the way she gripped me and told me
nunca olvides, tú eres una mujer bellísima. Empanadas
with your sister, and that little cafe right near her apartment.
Challe and how he made that entire dinner to welcome me
to his country. Your sister and I hanging out windows on
either side of the china cabinet, fumando y hablando, and
all of Lima lay before us. Julio showing me how to find the
perfect mango. He is the reason I never buy mangoes
anymore. The hole-in-the-wall restaurant in Sirquillo
where we ate chicharrones with pan francés. The human
bones under la iglesia de San Francisco, and how I wanted to
climb in with them. All the promises you made. Punto Azul
restaurant with your entire family, the fans blowing in my hair,
a band-aid over the problem. I still couldn’t stop sweating
and you through gritted teeth telling me to finish all of my
food, even though you knew how sick I was, because Tía
Perla was paying, and please, I don’t want my mother finding
out how ungrateful you are. Standing at the edge of
Larcomar and wondering if I jumped, would I go headfirst into
the rocks, or would God give me wings with which to fly away?
A disagreement in the park, your voice filled with contempt
telling me to stop behaving like a child, I was only mad
because I liked being mad. The smack that echoed in my
head as my open palm hit your cheek. The apologies I made.
The man who walked past me and groped my breasts through
my shirt, and how you mocked me for being as shaken
as I was. Yelling at me to say my d’s, you are married to
a Peruvian and not a Cuban, don’t you ever learn? Don’t
look at my cousin like that, I know how you American women
are. Coffee and a suspiro limeño with your sisters, and you
looking me up and down, and well, I hope you didn’t eat too
much. You need to look good for me. Whining about
having to get up early to take me to the airport.
Sitting with your brother as he told me how to stay safe in
Bogotá; pointers I didn’t really need but I appreciated the
gesture, anyway. I went to go catch my plane and when I turned
around to say goodbye, you were already gone. Your
brother waving and smiling,¡adiós, que te regreses
bien pronto! ¡Un día vaya yo a ir a tu país!
You were impatient on the sidewalk. You
could never wait to get away, and I still mean
the things I didn’t say.
You smelled like money when you pulled me out of the
Hudson, threw me a life raft in the form of a hundred
dollar bill. I wasn’t worth the 5 or 6 hours you spent
breathing the life back into me, as it’s all but
escaped by now. There’s an ache in me that even
fast food, JD, and nicotine haven’t succeeded at quelling,
and the familiarity of being comfortably numb beneath you has
worn off, and I don’t know which way to turn in
this dark room. Either way I go, I feel the reminders
in your knees, your elbows. My entire body is a jagged
edge, and there’s nothing left. I am an open wound.
They say that when I’m
happy, there’s a light inside of me that lights up, but I
haven’t felt the warmth of that light in years, and when you asked
me for proof that God doesn’t exist, I directed you into my eyes for
evidence that can’t be translated into any language.
You nodded softly and walked away as I sat on that staircase
that the entire world recognizes. It’s all there.
I was all the proof you ever needed.
"Anyone worth knowing breaks once.
Once.
No shame, no foul if you survive it."
what we are not told is that it is never a clean break.
it can never be stitched up
in the way that a surgeon with impeccable attention to detail
weaves the stitches
in and out, and over and under.
I cannot hide this scar you left when you drove the knife right into my chest
and twisted,
reversing the flow of blood through the heart.
I ask people to touch it, can they feel my heart beating beneath it?
My heart.
I don't wear it so much on my sleeve as I encase myself in it.
I am pulsing and throbbing, squeezing every breath out of life.
They hold me up at school assemblies.
This is your heart, and the mitral valve opens and closes,
and if you pay close enough attention you can see my soul tumble out.
I have tried to harden myself, toughen myself up
like the nicotine-hardened heart of the life-long smoker.
I gave up smoking a long time ago,
and all of that aside, people break from yearning, too.
In this room, right now, I can feel all of us
beating in perfect time.
While my mother always told me that I was too sensitive,
needed to learn to
laugh at myself,
toughen up &
grow a thicker skin,
I want no part in any of that.
The electricity that runs right through me
when I don't clear the person passing me in the stairwell
is what keeps me alive.
This only breaks you once.
Once.
Somewhere in breaking, you learn that if you want to be
someone who is trusted,
you need to be someone who trusts.
Your eyes are so empty.
Hold me tightly. Trace this scar in my chest.
It means I am still alive.