WEBVTT

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I'm going to read one more.

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25.

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I am la guera, which
sounds like la wetta, which

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is slang for la rubia,
the blonde one, polite

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for la gringa, that means
literally the fair one.

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That's what Fernando
tells me it means--

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the fair one.

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When we are at his Tía Norma's
house and the screen door slaps

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shut behind the boys--

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his younger cousins who
are chasing each other out

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into the yard, and I
hear them say la guera,

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I know they mean me.

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He has a cousin who
is also called Guera,

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because her skin is so white.

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But I have the la before
my guera which I know

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has its own significance,
like la reina the queen,

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as in she thinks
she's the queen--

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the only one.

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And so at the same time,
it's as if I'm singled out--

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or think I ought to be--

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a kind of joke maybe.

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But this is a new
mask, a new way

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of being invisible while
being in plain sight.

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I am simply who I appear to be
marked only by my appearance.

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I have become that surface.

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When I'm writing on
the old round green bus

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down South Sixth Avenue, the bus
with the windows pulled open,

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no air conditioning,
the bus so crowded

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that there is standing room only
and we may as well be in Italy

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or Mexico, and we pass the
carniceria and the tortilleria

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and the storefronts
painted bright yellow,

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or orange, or pink, with
blue letters and black

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wrought iron bars
over the windows,

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and the music of Spanish is
all around me, I am la guera.

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When I hold in my hands
at work the African trade

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beads, the shells, the turquoise
beads, when I iron the clothes

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and dust all the vases
and sculptures and bowls,

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when I sweep the front
walk and move the dust mop

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under the display cases, and
write up the sales tickets

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and give the rich old
ladies their change,

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or try on the
embroidered dresses

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so they can see how their
granddaughters might

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look in them, I am la guera.

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Something is changing.

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And even though soon someday
I will become Beth again,

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I will never be
exactly the same Beth.

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It has to do with this sojourn,
with this moving through my day

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in a completely different
rhythm, surrounded

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by new sounds, and
colors, and air,

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as if I have chosen to become
someone else in another life

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in another country--

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and in choosing
an exterior path,

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have set interior
change in motion.

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When I lie on the bed after work
and put my feet up on the wall

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because my ankles are
swollen, when I lie in the sun

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my hand across my belly,
I know I will never

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be the same person again.

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And it has everything to do with
being la guera and everything

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to do with the fact
that beneath my hand

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there is a swimmer,
a not yet child,

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his eyes blinking at the
shadows of my fingers.

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[APPLAUSE]

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