Family Roots (poem)- Journal 3
They tell me I have my fathers eyes, ever changing color and always focused
Combined with my mothers smile, the ever so slightest tooth gap that fills the room with contagion of joy and presence
My presence is subtle, yet powerful, like the pink sky above a hot June day in New York City
Colorful like Italian ice, comforting like cafe con leche with soda crackers from the tin
I reside above the border of Brooklyn and Queens, it seems as though I always reside among multiple worlds
The sound of Hector Lavoe fills my kitchen, smells like the homeade batch of sofrito made this morning, green from all the peppers
Green like the hidden sanctuary garden my great grandma made in her Brooklyn backyard that resembles her Sicilian farmhouse
The rooster crows every morning, the M train off of Seneca is your alarm clock
They say Im a jack of all trades like my late abuelo, who sold piraguas in Patillas with a love for the ocean and Bruce Lee
Pisces like me, a natural musician
Social and witty like my Gemini grandpa, who took night classes to learn English as he worked full time to feed 6
They say I have an intimidating walk and look like my Scorpio nana, Brooklyn in her step, always ready to fight, vaseline in her pocket
Strong legs like my Italian uncles who can outrun a bus
My brain calculates every second like a competitive game of dominoes at a BBQ, always remembering like my grandmother who kept all of my childhood belongings
My hair as burnt orange as the the map of Sicily in her dining room she never threw out, my skin the fairest olive like the inside of a Christmas flan with a side of Coquito
Respectful like Bendiciones at the end of a phone call, loud like an Italian Sunday dinner
I reside among two worlds, yet I often feel disconnected in a galaxy of space filled with my broken Nuyorican Spanish slang and lack of familiarity to the Amafi coast
Yet I am made among multiple roots of an old family tree
And that in fact, grounds me in everything I am
















