The women in my family have our own moon goddess:
Tejano superstar Selena Quintanilla.
Celestial in bodysuits and charro jackets,
she was star-bound, she woke up like this
a decade before Beyonce, she rocked rainbow bustiers
before Katy Perry could walk.
Like all stories about women and the moon,
this one canât finish without blood: she was killed
on the line between English and Spanish,
her first ingles album about to drop. I was seven.
My mother mustâve thought weâd have more time
to learn songs and dance moves, to scream-fight
I wasnât leaving the house like that
after Iâd seen her newest music video
and hot-glued costume jewelry to my bra.
Instead, Selena returned to the sky smelling like gunpowder,
and we remembered that Mexican goddesses
have a history of waning.
The women in my family keep our own vigils:
the DVD of Selena, starring Jennifer Lopez,
sits on my motherâs side table waiting to light up her TV like Mass.
Laura updates her Facebook status: sheâs at the Selena museum
in Corpus Christi. Death has not dampened our belief.
We cherish Christ the son and Selena the moon,
our call to love others and our dreams of loving ourselves.
I kept a doll in her likeness, a little idol whose dark hair
I combed faithfully, watching its disco jumpsuit catch starlight.
This is how I played church,
how I learned to honor the people who paved my way;
like how my sister and cousin learned to sing and dance
and it didnât seem impossible; we were all congregants
and the only prayer was bailar.
The women in my family speak sacred incantation,
bidi bidi bom bom and como la flor.
When I stand in karaoke fluorescence,
breathing in as much air as I can gulp,
I half-believe I resurrect Her:
little Texas with a lot of mouth,
open my lips and the Word comes out,
and whatâs a ghost if not our soulâs breath?
Whatâs a goddess if not a ghost we can call on
again and again, effortless as pressing play?
My sister texts a picture of her Selena-themed outfit,
faithfully reconstructed from holy writs.
Blessed be the hips that remember our Ladyâs hips,
the shape of figure eights and merengue.
Blessed be the lurex and the bustier.
We text her back constellations and mirrors,
a swirling perfect universe,
like if we collect enough fireflies
weâll finally be able to convince the world we shine.