A mother’s daughter

I lie awake at night–thinking about the woman who has made it possible for me to be here in all my essence. I think…how could anyone ever hurt her? 

She is the purest form of love I’ve ever known…She is my safe place. I often wonder if she has one but I don’t think so. I look at her and all I want to do is protect her, protect her from the world like she has protected me. 

I was young when I first saw su dolor. La pena de ser mujer. 

My young eyes didn’t understand why she was crying. Sus ojos, como el color de la tierra mojada…nunca estaban secos. She carried so much pain behind her one dimpled smile. She looked fine, no cuts, no bruises; only an absent husband. Dad wasn’t home, again. En la casita de dos cuartitos, todo se escucha. I could tell when he’d get home, she’d stopped crying y los llantos se convierten en reclamos. Reclamos llenos de dolor y odio. — ”Porque no quieres a mi papa?” I hate myself for ever questioning her. She was always there. I looked at the familiar stranger beside her, he looked and sounded como mi Apa, but it couldn’t be because en mis ojos él bajaba la luna y frente a mi, estaba un señor que a duras penas podía estar de pie. Él también llorando, con las caguamas a un lado y el cigarro en la mano. No money, no food. Solamente tenía para sus vicios. 

But it was okay because I had gone to bed with mi pancita llena, mis hermanas, mi hermano y yo always came first to her. Por ella nunca tuvimos hambre. 

“¿Por qué sigues con él?” I seem to be asking every Saturday now. She doesn’t need him for money, she never has. She doesn’t need him for company, he’s usually not there. I’m older now, so she answered. Now I know why she stays. And I suddenly understood why at 21 she’s always here, ready to hold me. Why she’s been my shelter and my protector. When she was little she had no one to protect her from the evil who was un amigo de la familia. When she was older, kicked and punched by her husband, there was no one to shelter her. She’s seen the face of maldad and yet here she is, always making sure I’m okay. 

Mensa y fea 

Son las palabras que ella usaría para describirse 

Valiente, Luchona, Fuerte, Gentil y Hermosa

Son las palabras que representan a la mujer que me parió 

I wish there was a way that I could love her more than I do now. That I could embrace her so tight, hold her and never let go. I wish that by loving her so kindly she could forget all those monstruos, all the men that make my dad seem like a saint. 

Me duele y grito mientras ella calla y sigue. That woman always goes on. And because she has the strength to go on…I’m here. I am because she is. Yo soy porque ella es.

-