I am fluent
In the act of hiding,
And my first tongue was
Guava season,
A scarcity of sentences
Reduced by a machete to
Maize.
It is said
That the First People
Could teleport, disappear
Right before your eyes.
My great grandmother
Tried to hide
Her children, for fear
That their father
Would take them to his
Motherland.
And she saw
That this was not
Good
To have her offspring
Uprooted, flung
From where they’d
Been grown
To foreign coasts.
And her language was
Hardened by
Years of hardships,
So, her only option was to
Act how she
Was accustomed.
Hiding her kids with
Other relatives.
Offering no soft solace
To her rough edges.
And my grandmother
Became fluent in this
Language.
And my mother
Became fluent in this
Language.
And I, too
Inherited this language
Of hiding and
Hardening.
