Waiting for the light...

She is not afraid of the dark
though I am a coward at it still
her footsteps trek the twenty feet
from her room to ours with the
diligence of a water fall
and arrives at our bed,
whispers "Mima"
this is enough for my sleeping
arms to swoop her into
the folds of our one heated mass
where I place her between
the giant of a man and her
little mother's breasts

She will nurse in the dark
we will say nothing in the
absence of light
I swallow my fears as I look
at the blackness in my mind
then, I am able to see that
she trusts in the night
to take our sleep to
the doorstep of the
universe where we will
knock and will wait
for someone to turn
on the porch light
and open the door

On nursing (a.k.a. "Tuti")

She had only breathed air for three minutes when she attached herself to my breast in the marvel of survival. I watched her motions carefuly amazed at the mysteriousness of her little body filling my arms in small pellets of light. All I could say was "mi corazon, mi corazon" as I held her and watched the face of her ancestors materialize. Hard to believe that I have given her sustenance and love this way for a year and a half.

Tonight at bedtime, she asks for "Tuti" (a derrivative of "Chi Chi") and looks at me with a smile and lifted brows. She knows how to charm sweet milk into her mouth. There is no difference between what I have given and what she has gained. The ying yang swishes about in the wholeness of our union. There have been moments that I despised nursing when her demand was so high and I was in an absolute hysteria because I was fraile and malnurished. She drank with impatience and authority with no mind to my withering. Other times, I stare at her ancient face and I quietly let all of my hopes fall into her suckling like one sees a pitcher fill a glass. These are the times when the hormones send us off to sleep and we fly into a magenta sky and witness the majesty of living. She is alive and nursing and sleeping. I am alive and giving, mothering and yes, loving. We are alive and flying. Dreaming. Breathing. Surviving.

A Spanglish dictionary of Ave-speak.

A - abi!- as in to open or abrir
B - Biba - as in Pipa which is Papi flipped
C - toton - as in corazon
Ch - chaves - as in Cesar Chaves
D - dume - as in give me or da me
E - petetante - as in elefante
F- ores - as in flores
G - tatito - as in gatito which is also "mo"
H - oya - as in hola or hello
I - uno - she reads all I's as the number one
J - yadin - as in garden or jardin
K - talo - as in "frita talo" or frida kahlo
L - yeon - as in leon or graaar!
LL - llaves - she's got the "ye" sound down
M - Mima - as in Mami, now only said under distress
N - niz - as in nariz or "nena nose"
O - opeta - as in opera que "tanta andres poteti" canta Andrea Bocelli, ooooaaaa!
P - Potato - as in Potato the legendary percussionist
Q - tatatilla - as in quesadilla filled with "tetito" as in quesito!
R - jyojyo - as in rojo, red
S - tatos-nanan- as in Santos-Salazar, she can't begin, only can finish with "ssss"
T - topeta - as in trumpet or trompeta followed by a big pucker
U - uno - if read, as in I, if spoken, as in the beginning of counting
V - vites- as in vistes or did you see?
W - wawa - el "o-o-u" or doble u is easy to say as in camion or bus
X - etis - as in exis or x
Y - Yeya - as in maternal abuelita con "bozo" rebozo y "sole" pozole
Z - papapos - as in zapatos

Ah the compost...

Ave and I spent the day in the garden. We are waiting for the bulbs to come up from the earth. I was prunning the summer's dead splendor -- the roses, the hydrangea, the oleander, the cannas, the lantana. I am also looking for a place to bury the placentas that fed my two children. Avelina wore her green water boots that grandma dot gave her which worked magic to keep those lil' toes dry. She hand watered every plant she could reach using a little pot that came in her dish set. Amidst prunning and watering and waiting for the green tops of the bulbs to peak out of the dirt, I came upon the compost. Ah the compost, the sorry little corner of the garden whose walls have come down in neglect, needed some attention. I figured I had done everything right in disposing of my kitchen scraps and leaves there. I had bought a bag full of worms to speed up the process and thought I'd have rich dirt soon. That was four years ago when I first moved in and found this a lot-full of weeds. I'd check on it periodically and saw that nothing was happening until today. I lifted the screen that tops it and saw a small mountain of black rich soil sitting patiently and transformed. There was no trace of leaves or twigs or egg shells. What a miracle - good things take time, like growing a baby and growing dirt. The cycles of life are churning beneath our own feet in spite of and because of neglect. It is clear that even the dead can flourish, if surrendered to the elements.

"Vamos a 'minar." Yes, a caminar...

All of Avelina's fingers wrap tightly around only two of my fingers when we walk. My thumb touches the puffy top of her hand which I stroke so that she feels safe. There is an angel that follows behind. Rememberance. Ave is not concerned that we've just walked through mud or that the road ahead is riddled with rocks and might fold itself into the mountain. She is alive with the present pace,
steps and laughs with
the abandon of her childhood,
looks only at her moving feet
running down the slope
and crashes into my arms

This moment fades only for me.
I follow the trail of my own
worry of letting her go
and I get lost...
tomorrow she will no longer
hold my hand,
and the road would have shrunk,
the laughter would have turned
from right now into yesterday...

I forget that it is quite possible
that she will still carry that
angel on her shoulder
who will remind her of my
caressing thumb holding her safe
while she walks alone into the forest

Missing...

I lost a tooth today. "This is a sacrifice for being a mother," the dentist said. My mom-in-law said she lost a tooth with every child she bore. This is a part of being a mother nobody tells you about along with that you will forever sleep with one eye open. What will I do with a missing molar? I can act as if nothing happened. Denial works in mysterious ways. But there is a hole in my mouth, though not as big as the one in my chest. I've lost a tooth today and last week a friend lost her mother, yet another lost her dog and I am still losing my first-born child. Are they "lost" or are they hovering above their former cavity, persisting only in our thoughts. The space that loss fills feels enormous when something or someone is gone...