Each Morning We walk through the field to the asphalt road to minimize the dust. Abuelo has a bad right knee. He leans. Checks my nails like he knows God wanted hygiene. Takes his handkerchief. Wipes my shoes before he walks back home. Seven hours I wait for the last bell. Recess. Do over again. Our grandparents wait outside the iron gate. Abuelo will soon use the last of his gel. Doors will open. Dust will cover our hands. Abuelo says our moms & real dads are somewhere cold where streets & air are clean. Abuelo stands alone. Combing his hair. Away from other men. Away from the traka-traka-traka-traka of the horse carriages’ wooden wheels, what a waste of road, Abuelo says...
Cholera flying ants come after the rains the house is under the rule of his birthday— balloons on a string around the coffin the sky seems about to crack again but the confetti never comes the first bar the only adequate whorehouse his Great-Great Grandma owned half the town news of her death travels slowly men play cards shouting the people we love should take everything they own with them in his chest he feels something like silver it’s long & gray the road they have to walk next day nobody tells him to sleep nobody feeds him a bit of string a deflated balloon he won’t laugh this year it is he who finds his Great-Great Grandma on her bed without dentures listening to the radio
Javier Zamora was born in El Salvador and migrated to the United States when he was nine years old. He holds fellowships from CantoMundo, Colgate University, the Lannan Foundation, the Poetry Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and Stanford University. His first book, Unaccompanied, was published by Copper Canyon Press in September 2017.