She shook her head from left to right
than right to left.

Where is your passport? – He asked again,
and she shrugged her shoulders

Are you trying to enter into this country illegally?
He continued,
and she extended her frail pale arms
and her pale white hands
into a position favorable for handcuffing,
lowering her head toward the ground
and thrusting her gaze
upon that yellow line
marking the floor in front of customs

There she was:
her silhouette
a broken willow
at the gates of heaven
or the gates of hell

because the difference between life and death
is measured by a few inches of distance
and her coordinates
in relation to that yellow line
in space
and time.

Where is your passport, ma’m?

She did not know enough language to tell him
that she did not have a passport
because she had not had a country since 15 years old;
too young, then, where she came from
to have a passport issued to her lost name,
and the only way she knew how the borders were crossed
was illegally;
that is all she had done…

The first time,
she crossed a mountainous line
the Greek border,
inside the trunk of a Mercedes Benz;
the second,
an imaginary watery line toward Italy
in the belly of a ship
or the belly of a whale

the blindfold made it impossible to tell

the third time
the Swiss Alps

the fourth
Germany

packed up inside a box in the back of an 18-wheeler
that was transporting children’s toys
because that’s what she was:
a toy
a sex toy
a child
a child prostitute
a girl prostitute
a woman prostitute

as time and age progressed

She always traveled like that
handcuffed to some piece of cold metal structure
or landscape,
in the company
of gorilla size men
who always celebrated the successful crossing of yellow lines
by sealing marks and bruises on her body
and intruding in her soul
through the open wound in between her thighs
that never had enough time
to heal

this
was the first time
that she traveled alone

old at 23,
in search of a name
in search of an identity
in search of a passport
in search of a country

and the difference between life and death
was measured by a few fatal inches of distance
and her coordinates in time and space
in relation to that yellow line
marking the floor in front of customs
at an American airport.

I am sitting on a Pepto-Bismol color chair
staring at my mother eclipsing
striking a bargain with pain and bribing sleep
her veins tied to a drip- drip- dripping IV
her pajamas pink and purple
make her look more vulnerable
a childlike yellow doll
dangling in the deep recesses of her breath
and coming back each time with a new suggestion
for a nonexistent baby’s name

Three of them she lost
that I never knew about until now
One to poverty – you can’t eat just pickles when you’re pregnant
one to my father’s anger- for a drunken man will make you cry
vinegar tears that run the color off your skin and seed off your womb
one to her fear
But how
do you miss a child you never had?
Like a song assassinated in flight
like a word sunk in the well of the throat

She is startled by the struggle in her gut
cancer is eating her inside
but all she thinks to do is weep
the vortex, the black hole
once inhabited by her womb
now removed like a flooded shore
and instead of it, on her skin grows a continent of wounds

She weeps
she thinks she lost her unborn children for good
I did not know that they inhabited her walls all these years
that the infant hymns she knitted at dusk
were not merely nostalgia for my dippers
those moments when she used to become so translucent
an albino moon strolling over narrow pathways in gardens of pots and dishes
and there were always proportionate leftovers on the stove
because she strove to love as all the same
although three of us were always absent

I am a jealous sibling right now
she wants to go join them
where she can finally see their faces
and I think it’s unfair
I have always been here
the responsible one
so now I choose to be difficult
demonstratively sitting crookedly on my chair
stomping my feet
pitching a fit
demanding attention:
look at me
look at me
look what I can do:
I can stand here and hold on to you
yellow broken doll
an equinox of IV’s
an autumn of fallen hair
a sad, sad poem in your restless endeavor
to have to choose between your children
This side that side
inside outside
and life is just a big place
filled with awake and regrets
unfinished poems
unwritten languages
miscarried intentions
and well kept mistakes

A story carved out between uneven parentheses
one child on the hips
three in the womb
she is floating like light inside of an aquarium
she is swimming in morphine
she is morphing
she is a mermaid gasping for air
at the edge of my Pepto-Bismol archipelago
caught on the rocks of my violent prayer
and I will not let her go
I will not let her
I will overcome with my ranging rancor
I will not let her go
I will not let her
I will loan her my womb
to be a stubborn anchor
I will not let her go
I will not let her
my fury is justified
my anger is good
my determination is a burning bush

I will not let her
I will not let her
I will not let her

Look at me
Look at me, mother
Look at me

And stay.

It has been some Sundays that I awake alone
and the face of your absence is unruly and rough with stubble
the edge of the distance steep and sharp
so I turn on your electric razor
and I let it hum hymns to the foreground of my chores
as I sing to its beat and tune words like these:

I am my beloved and mine he is

I will be your back if yours breaks
I will drink you with my hands like a holy grail
I will not be frail
again
Your stolen youth I will not weep
I will build an altar and worship your limbs
Like the body of Christ
With my untiring hands I will conjure your sleep
In my grace I will give you rest
My womb will be your strength
Terrible as an army
Strong as a wall
Beautiful as a vineyard
I will bear you sons and daughters that will outrun death
Whose bodies will conquer kingdoms of impossibilities
and your pain

We will grow old cheering them on from bleachers
praying for them path and wind
and none of this will be in vain

So I sing
until the Sunday morning
when I awake
to the low buzz hum of your electric razor
changing tones of whispers as it traverses your face
and I hear your voice again

arise my love, my friend
it is time to worship