it is Sunday morning
i am sure because each note of Latin music is perfectly matched with a brooms heartbeat
i see her dancing
her feet never seeming to miss a single checkered tile
the sun bows to the thousand ray orchestra of her eyes
each pupil a coffee bean
like the ones that she picked when she was only a girl
leaving her only enough change to ride the bus home
knees collapse at the confident quiver tone of her thick Hispanic accent.
like the small collection of hairs on her upper lip.
a symbol of legacy.
thick and unforgiving.
mouth titanium with each word bullets of unrelenting accuracy
heart worn hard by miles of walking from place
to country
to child through tornados
. a whirlwind woman.
i am born of whirlwind women.
if you listen closely you can hear my grandmothers trembling voice shake the dirt streets of Costa Rica
where she sold hand-pressed tortillas in order to feed the mouths waiting for her
the legacy that precedes me is women.
valiente, seguro de sí mismo, radiante
these women with aching hands
are potters
grinding together silt and sand
molding history with frail fingertips and making Fresca bowls for their salsa
only to have the men shatter their work
they rebuild. made palaces from fragments.
i see it in my mother’s sunspots
all the small pieces of clay.