after José Olivarez
because we’re here: everywhere.
loud. & colorful. & yes
we know crooked but o bless
our mothers’ hands. what miracles
they carve out of our spines.
what blessing it is to swim
in the rivers inside our fathers’
and mothers’ palms. & how we toil
to prove that the way
they move with the wind or
the current of the sea is not
in vain. it’s why we’re everywhere:
in & on the courts, in hospitals, on tv, on
the radio, in books. to make, especially,
our fathers smile. each smile a snow
leopard we’ve seen maybe once
or twice. can’t remember where
but we sure do remember the holy of it.
we’re here, singing our songs
and dancing our dances, laughing
with gravity—a long
lost kin—as it gently rocks
a paper note after another
from sweaty foreheads to the ground.
