I Remember Lotería

I remember nights of playing Lotería w/Mom & Big Manny as a way to learn the Spanish they spoke to each other but not to their kids who caught on to certain words like cállate,cerveza,chicharrón; little nuggets I ate up like the pinto beans we used instead of the blue chips Mom kept in her Bingo bag she carried every Friday night when her & Tia Shirley went to the Moose Lodge, her hair & coat reeking w/the smoke of all who lost. I remember El Borracho, the man always holding a bottle & about to fall over yet never does like Big Manny stumbling home late at night after a payday, breath & belly full of beer, who one time took a piss in our bedroom. I remember La Garza, not for the heron it is but cousin Tony & his kids, nights of sleepovers & pizza, PlayStation on a 40-inch TV, the night he & Lil Jesse sneaked bumps of coke in the bathroom & I rubbed numb my teenage teeth. I remember El Musico, not the chubby man clutching his guitarra but my brother Dave loading crates of records & a dual turntable case like a coffin into the back of a van, the same set I hit my back on at ten when I fell out of the top bunk bed. But I prefer to remember La Sirena back when her breasts were free of the seashells she now holds to cover them in water so blue cold, her scales so red, her name clung to the tongue like dulce de leche.