Javier Zamora

at a certain time the kitten stopped moving I wanted to see if it would burn rain like cane fields when they’re scorched after harvesting through the phone Abuelita remembers the black kitten I threw in the fire still trying to crawl out that ash isn’t snow Abuelo said shirtless I picked up a mound in my hand if I look back at my front door barefoot kids in the street try catching the flakes on their tongues come visit us they say nextyearnextyear I’ll try again dust covers the roof my toys my hair my expired work permit burns black the sky it is march again & again there’s no wind Abuelita asks us to send a bag of autumn leaves she wants to keep in a book the color so pretty interesting what if there’s no wind I ask while acid at Joshua Tree camping the slight movements of the twigs of the ocotillo sound like mice deep in their burrows with the silence of only this pen writing the only words I can hear hella yellow now I’m in a similar dirt to Abuelita’s yellow but here there’s healing the cold the sky the same I’m staring at clouds the same thought of then now again I could this could be the very cloud the very dirt but this time I’m happy yes I can be I’m smiling

For Chino In the middle of that desert that didn’t look like sand and sand only, in the middle of those acacias, whiptails, and coyotes, someone yelled “¡La Migra!” and everyone ran. In that dried creek where 40 of us slept, we turned to each other and you flew from my side in the dirt. Black-throated sparrows and dawn hitting the tops of mesquites, beautifully. Against the herd of legs, you sprinted back toward me, I jumped on your shoulders, and we ran from the white trucks. It was then the gun ready to press its index. I said, “freeze, Chino, ¡pará por favor!” So I wouldn’t touch their legs that kicked you, you pushed me under your chest, and I’ve never thanked you. Beautiful Chino— the only name I know to call you by — farewell your tattooed chest: the M, the S, the 13. Farewell the phone number you gave me when you went east to Virginia, and I went west to San Francisco. You called twice a month, then your cousin said the gang you ran from in San Salvador found you in Alexandria. Farewell your brown arms that shielded me then, that shield me now, from La Migra.

It was dusk for kilometers and bats in the lavender sky, like spiders when a fly is caught, began to appear. And there, not the promised land, but barbwire and barbwire with nothing growing under it. I tried to fly that dusk after a bat said la sangre del saguaro nos seduce. Sometimes I wake and my throat is dry, so I drive to botanical gardens to search for red fruit clutched to saguaros, the ones at dusk I threw rocks at for the sake of slashing hunger. But I never find them here. These bats say speak English only. Sometimes in my car, that viscous red syrup clings to my throat, and it’s a tender seed toward my survival: I also scraped needles first, then carved those tall torsos for water, then spotlights drove me and thirty others dashing into palos verdes, green-striped trucks surrounded us, our empty bottles rattled and our breath spoke with rust. When the trucks left, a cold cell swallowed us.

When I sleep I see a child hidden between the legs of a scarred man, their sunburnt backs breathe cold air, the child faces me and the pier’s roof swallows the moon cut by the clouds behind them. Sometimes, they’re on the same roof wearing handkerchiefs and uniformed men surround them. I mistake bullet casings for cormorant beaks diving till water churns the color of sunsets, stained barnacles line the pier and I can’t see who’s facedown on boats lulled by crimson ripples. Once, I heard the man — alive and still on the roof — say today for you, tomorrow for me. There’s a village where men train cormorants to fish: rope-end tied to sterns, another to necks, so their beaks won’t swallow the fish they catch. My father is one of those birds. He’s the scarred man.

Yes, your face like asphalt dust on my tongue whenever it rains. I’ll say it’s the last time I call, tomorrow. In your arms it won’t be the same, each step farther from the border. Gin and tonics. Tequila grapefruits. I threw that black mug at your face after gin, after tequila, I didn’t know Enrique’s Journey would trigger me, I’m sorry. I drank too much. I drink too much, yes, I know. It wasn’t me who threw it, I said, but it was. It’s me who needs to learn how to face grandpa’s bullet shells, bottles, broken chairs, doors he woke us up with. I was four. I saw Mom between his gun and Grandma. I was four. I need to forgive the coins he placed in my hands to buy him vodka. Grandpa chased every single one of his daughters with his machete in the middle of the day, in the middle of the night, I didn’t know what to do except climb the water tower across the street with Red Power Ranger. He’s chased us to this country that trained him to stay quiet when “his boss” put prisoners in black bags, then pushed them out the truck, “for everyone to see what happens to bad people here.” Gin, straight up. Tequila shots. I’ve picked up the shards in our apartment, wiped the black smudge next to our bed, promised never to do it again, that I’ll seek help, but I don’t. I make an excuse. No one understands why Abuelita never left him. It’s mid-June, Venus and Mars the closest they’ve been in 2,000 years, but I’ve never seen grandparents hug, or hold hands. I make an excuse. You kept rubbing your hands. When I turned six grandpa quit drinking. He stayed at home at night but never talked to us. He didn’t like gin. Didn’t like writers. Didn’t like leftists. Everyone gone except one aunt. You’re not here. Tomorrow, tampoco. These walls snore like grandpa’s slurred shouts. I thought the border would take him. All my aunts, my mom, thought so too. We’re all running from the sun on his machete. The moon on his gun.

among thirty dusty men the only wet thing the mouth of the coyote is a mini zoo we are from many countries in which there are many coyotes 500 bucks and we’re off think about it is the shortest verse of a corrido a gila monster and a coyote are one a gila monster and a coyote and a gringo are one strewn bottles melt dirt the coyote’s tongue fills them we don’t know which to swat the coyote or the froth the mosquitoes or the flies gringos why do you see us illegal don’t you think we are the workers around you we speak different accents yours included and we know también the coyote is suspect of what we say when the coyote hears helicopters in Nike shoes he trots Arizona Nogales whores close their doors the coyote trots Arizona in Nike shoes the desert is still the coyote must be tired in his shadow he sees searchlights it’s day all night it’s dusting and it’s going to dust the coyote rests under yuccas

Calláte. Don’t say it out loud: the color of his hair, the sour odor of his skin, the way they say his stomach rose when he slept. I have done nothing, said nothing. I piss in the corner of the room, the outhouse is far, I think orange blossoms call me to eat them. I fling rocks at bats hanging midway up almond trees. I’ve skinned lizards. I’ve been bored. It’s like that time I told my friend Luz to rub her lice against my hair. I wanted to wear a plastic bag, to smell of gasoline, to shave my hair, to feel something like his hands on my head. When I clutch pillows, I think of him. If he sleeps facedown like I do. If he can tie strings to the backs of dragonflies. I’ve heard of how I used to run to him. His hair still smelling of fish, gasoline, and seaweed. It’s how I learned to walk they say. Calláte. If I step out this door, I want to know nothing will take me. Not the van he ran to. Not the man he paid to take him. Mamá Pati was asleep when he left. People say somehow I walked across our cornfield at dawn, a few steps behind. I must have seen him get in that van. I was two. I sat behind a ceiba tree, waiting. No one could find me.

We knew something was wrong when next to the TV, a large tomatillo plant was growing out the carpet. Everything there spoke, Table, Lamps    ... In the living room, Coffee Table’s eyes glued to the TV: flags, drums, hands on the chest on the screen, but it couldn’t have been Independence. It was the fifth of the fifth month, something about a battle won, a battle lost. Our host, Dining Table, handed each of us a green sphere.Eat, s’il vous plaît. Don’t think about it, she told us; then sent Chair and Coffee Table to sleep. Watch the bedbugs. You can’t unlock the windows, Fan in the hallway said. For two weeks Table left tomatillos outside our door. The green marbles punched through our stomachs, so deep, our ears grew roots. It was as if no heat. Bed wished she was bigger. Closet dreaded his clothes. Wall didn’t let us sleep; kept saying, ¡Look! Look over there, cabrones. You’ll never make it there. If you’re gonna ask for the best route, the best price. ¿Where are your suspenders? ¿Dress shoes? You’re not really serious about getting to San Francisco. ¿Are you? Pinche dirty pigeons.

Salvador, if I return on a summer day, so humid my thumb will clean your beard of  salt, and if  I touch your volcanic face, kiss your pumice breath, please don’t let cops say:he’s gangster. Don’t let gangsters say:he’s wrong barrio. Your barrios stain you with pollen, red liquid pollen. Every day cops and gangsters pick at you with their metallic beaks, and presidents, guilty. Dad swears he’ll never return, Mom wants to see her mom, and in the news: every day black bags, more and more of us leave. Parents say: don’t go; you have tattoos. It’s the law; you don’t know what law means there. ¿But what do they know? We don’t have greencards. Grandparents say:nothing happens here. Cousin says:here, it’s worse. Don’t come, you could be... Stupid Salvador, you see our black bags, our empty homes, our fear to say:the war has never stopped, and still you lie and say:I’m fine, I’m fine, but if  I don’t brush Abuelita’s hair, wash her pots and pans, I cry. Like tonight, when I wish you made it easier to love you, Salvador. Make it easier to never have to risk our lives.