Casa Migrante
His hands are newly large.
He woke up with them yesterday and
they were his to stare at.
Large quiet hands that don’t yet
ask or answer questions.
He shoves them into his pockets
in the cold cafeteriaglow and curls
over their generic preciousness
looks through long lashes to the side
as his mother relishes! in detail.
He looks neither at her nor away as
wild and smiling she stands to show the audience
the way the other son was filleted
like a fish where
the bullet went in, pokes her finger
to where her chest says “Yale”
where Extermination poked a gun into his and
who is the audience here? he wonders
And the audience takes off a grey wool vest and
gives it to him gracias a Dios he is
freezing
his hands working the snaps and the snaps being the best part.
His jaw is numb when he tries to move it but
Go to bed, says the audience.
Tomorrow the audience will take him again, and his mother
first to a car that sings “you may find yourself
behind the wheel of a large automobile” to where he will
sit on the sidewalk again
under the tree again
to wait in line again
until gracias a Dios
they cross into prison until
gracias a Dios one
day he will no longer be
patient frozen marble until
gracias a Dios
his hands will come out of the pockets and make
something touch
someone be warm
one day again.
❤️ ❤️ ❤️