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A Latina, young and beautiful,
with black ringlets to my waist
topped with the rhinestone veil my sister wore
and the communion dress
of satin and lace made by my
Grandma just for me.
I was a bride for Jesus
as they paraded us through the streets
past St. Cecelia’s celebrating our purity,
in a neighborhood, anything but pure,
with junkies and dealers on the street
thick as cockroaches in the kitchen
on a Monday morning,
always there.
Ten years later, not as cute,
with my tongue pierced
and my short black hair,
I can still turn heads.
Thick.
With meat on my bones that
shows my curves,
a real woman who always
earns the attention of the black men
with their attitude of invincibility.
They give me a smile
and a line and tell me they can rock my world
and make me see Jesus,
but I just smile and walk on by.
I’ve been there before,
fourteen,
not a girl, but still not a woman,
riding a man twice my age who painted me with compliments
until he got me into bed,
then taunted me with words of anger,
as he raped me,
telling me to call him daddy,
while he pulled my hair
like the reins of a pony,
no words of love or passion,
but I didn’t cry, or tell a soul.
Me, just another claim of victory,
won by his slick lies,
and no I didn’t see Jesus,
though I prayed the Hail Mary.
Now, far wiser, I know men and their
attitude and come on lines,
but I only bite when I want to, no longer
needing a man to build me up or pay my way.
I don’t have much, but it’s all mine.
I see the world as it really is.
Saturday night I take the train
with my girlfriends into Manhattan,
dressed in my new pressed blue jeans,
tight enough to show my curves,
and a knock-off Dolce and Gabana top
I bought in Chinatown.
I’m no J-Lo, but I’m still fine
and damn, I dance better than her.
Early Sunday morning, after the clubs close,
we stop at the all-night diner and eat waffles
and laugh about the men we met with silk suits
and gold chains and their polished silky
see through lines that only my best friend Rosalina buys,
going home with some new Latin lover each time.
My girlfriends tease me, pregnant without a man,
knowing, not telling, who the father is, ‘cuz I don’t need
a man to make me, me.
Baby, I’m Maria Rosa Gonzalez
and I’ve already worn that wedding dress
when I was eight and
I got a tattoo of Jesus on my back to prove I was once a bride.
I get all I need cleaning apartments in the city,
three girls and my cousin working for me.
No longer a child, I’m a business woman, moving into a nice
apartment in the Bronx, all my own, in the springtime.
10 February 2009
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