You Must Endure Your Own Suffering By Rocío Iglesias

In this country that has been our hope and our void,

I am standing here wearing my mother’s heart

My thumbs pressed against my phone like a bleeding wound,

“I’m sorry,” “I love you,” “no lo quiero creer”

the lamentations mean more in Spanish, the roots run deeper 

My body twisted, sweaty and unpretty, 

into the involuntary familiarity of “what now?”

nausea blooming in my stomach and rising through my chest like a sharp red flower,

my mind geolocates my American passport, my naturalization certificate

so that I can finally let the tears come,

my face draped beneath them like my name, Rocio, dew drops

Okay so we will have to return to the place of villainous darkness

To when they made each act of living feel like a snare, or a cliff

These in-between days are a ghost world, a past life half lived in the future,

And today?

Today they can come to my house and try to tell me it’s not my home

Stomp through my kitchen in dirty boots, 

Rifle through my personal effects and tell me which ones bring me joy 

But the thing is, 

I know them better this time around

I know this enemy is sinister like a practical joke, 

plywood left in the rain, 

moving behind the curtain of a screen 

unable to meet the hot-brand of a woman’s direct eye contact 

So, what if they cannot do it?

What then, if they cannot make me feel unwelcome here?

What if I meet them at the door, 

Creep down on all fours, 

Hollow out my own throat,

And bark 

Rocío Iglesias is a queer Cuban-American poet. Her work has appeared in various print and electronic publications and can most recently be found in Poetry South and O, Miami. She lives, breathes, and works in the Twin Cities, MN.