Sin Vergüenza (Como los Pájaros)
04/28/2026 14:58h
The woman in the documentary reaches her hands
to the fence touches her child through an opening
De mis manos dolor When I was a child my mama
drove me to the swap meet on the other side
for a white dress & flowered wreath my first
Holy Communion the mamas nursing
on the roadside selling chicle con sus
manos libres Abuelo once rode in the casket
of a trunk He rose again on our side of the border
which crossed Bisabuela’s family Look
from my balcony the sleeping sister
volcanoes shaped like breasts I’ve
thought about leaving Shoving
a duffel bag & laptop into the car taking
the dog But these babies I’ve wanted since
I was a child That’s what girls do where I grew up
down the road from a landfill in the humid stench
of a beef plant & sugar beets hulled & boiled
for their sweet white meat I found an animal in a trap
who’d fought her way through high grasses
wasting to carcass in my own backyard
& I believe you know what a merciful act means
I don’t know the words for the shame I’ve carried
The woman in the documentary needs papers
to get back to her children They’d found her
in the hospital without insurance la migra
Mama nursed women who’d run through asparagus fields’
crackling heat bellies full against the barbed wire
they’re still burying like umbilicals roots on a battlefield
if the child’s a boy or the place where tortillas are made
for a girl Don’t you dare say desert
The heat is unbearable & I’ve seen
them pulling anchors from legs
cursing bullet shells In the hospital facing pig barns
& a graveyard Mama in her scrubs & gloves
pulling newborns bloodied like suicide wrists Jars
of coins for the ferryman & La Virgen burning
an altar on my nightstand Mis manos Mis hijos
Whatever fence I’ve erected from that salted curse
in my family’s blood Release us
The woman on the screen whispers a prayer Fly us
free as birds Sin vergüenza I admit the darkness
I’ve swallowed the hollow inside Now who will
unpin our hands & toward sky upraise them