Maria

Memory & Faith

A picture of Guadalupe on a piece of dark green felt, soft yet

coarse to the touch. The emblem stays pinned underneath a picture

of a uterus, on the ceiling of my car. Watching over me as I

begin to drive down the road.

Not a person that believes in religion

But I believe in sentimentality

Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe

Was her Saint

In a way she’s mine too

Because when I see Guadalupe

I think of Maria Costa

And I start to think believing in something

Might not be that bad

I bless myself before I leave

When I see a dead animal on the road

When my heart skips a beat

She blessed for God’s protection

I bless for comfort

To feel the caress of her hand on my arm

Cold to the touch

The last words she ever gave me

“you’re going to do so many great things, great things”

It’s hard to believe that

When I’m writing poems holed up in my room

On the edge of nowhere

I see her in every place I’ve ever loved

I feel her in the passenger seat

I feel her when the tears won’t stop coming

When my voice is too tight to come out, I feel her come

through me and project her own voice

She gives me the push and I pull back

But she can’t stay.

Language & Heritage

Dark green; soft yet coarse, watching over me

A language thats knots are unraveling before I can catch them in my hands

Retie them with a mix of blood

I can see her smile

And feel her laughter run through me as she slips into Portuguese

And I nod along trying to decipher

What she is saying

Now I write on dead trees to get others

To understand me

But it seems I also communicate in a language others are

unfamiliar with

And how can I feel a longing and a sadness for a place I’ve

never known?

How can I make plans to board a plane

When it doesn’t feel like I should have access to this culture

No matter how much I wish to have this piece of her

Am I the inheritor of this language?

Is it mine to take? Is it something I can ever hope to learn or

just another lost cause?

Lost cause

There seems to be a lot of those

I don’t know if anything I do feels right

If it’ll soothe the fire I was born with

I wonder if it’s worth trying to cool

Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe

Watching over me

She was my Saint

Better than any religion could fake

And now I must figure out for myself

If I’m all she thought I was

Dark green felt

Soft

Yet coarse

To the

Touch.