My tongue clumsily crashes against the cathedral ceilings of my palate,
It helplessly tries to pick up the broken mirror,
the one she was holding when she tripped
yes, she tripped with the pencil between my front teeth,
the one the teacher suggested I...
"Place this between your teeth,
push your tongue away from the pencil now say r-r-r-rose"
my tongue refuses, she kicks and screams
"¡No quiero, me quieres romper la espalda carajo!''
(I don't want to, you want break my back, fuck!)
I feel terrible, she has only known Spanish from birth,
and now at thirteen years old, I am throwing her
into contortions we both never imagined
we had to learn fast to be understood in this...country
but it just happened! One day I left my friends,
the house with the tall windows, the cats,
the stray dogs I fed every morning,
and we headed North.
You see one day I was trying to read out loud,
"De biutiful bitch" my class roared with laughter,
She shily hid in a corner,
blushing from failing to perform the new contortions
of these new lands...she face-planted before them,
"you say beach long e not bitch with the short i"
my poor friend can't relax, and keeps tripping
in my mouth, I try to hold her hand but it I useless,
she is trying but she keeps accidentally insulting
Hemingway with her Mexican accent.
But through the years,
and the many tears we got better,
just like the guitarist and their calloused hands
we too, had bruised knees, bloody knuckles
and a self-esteem on the mend,
a very sturdy golden scar in its hands
showed the world how
we became magicians,
how we made colors our of gray,
how we became chameleons:
in French, Farsi, Mandarin Chinese,
Tagalog, Korean, and even Arabic.
We broke out of our cast,
the one that fear placed us on
and dared to write
"get better!" on the dirty bandages
after we threw it away
we found our calling,
we connected doctors to their patients,
lawyers to their clients
children to their grandparents,
and book authors to their audiences.
She...healed me in unknown winds,
and together we sit in this room with you
sharing our story and asking you
to love the tripping accents,
those trying to fit a mold that wasn't created
for their incomparable beauty.
When they speak and sound different,
be very kind for one wrong move
can have their souls hiding in the torment
of unnecessary shame and pain,
what you say friend?
Will you be kind to the stranger whose accent is a vulnerable map inviting you to the warmth of their home country?